The IFRC GIS Training Platform is a collaborative and open source platform developed by Red Cross societies in collaboration with the Heidelberg Institute for Geoinformation Technology (HeiGIT). The platform provides a modular and hands-on GIS training curriculum using QGIS and specifically designed to match and support humanitarian use cases. The training programme enables learners with basic information management or data skills—but little or no prior GIS experience—to start creating, using, and analysing spatial data effectively.

The platform includes interactive tutorials, real-world data exercises and practical examples that resonate with humanitarian professionals. The content is designed so that anyone can use the materials to run their own trainings without relying on a central team. This model has already been adopted by several National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, resulting in a growing network of GIS-trained humanitarian practitioners who are also empowered to pass on their knowledge to others.

This talk will outline the project’s aims and progress so far, and will be of interest to anyone involved in GIS training and skills development, or in humanitarian GIS workflows.