Open Data Collection in Refugee Settlements

[Jamon Van Den Hoek]

Dear Colleagues,

Please see the presentation from last week's kickoff meeting:

G. Kateregga (2021). Open Data Collection in Refugee Settlements. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aw6_caa4f8&t=4783s

This presentation deals with some of the most essential information gaps in understanding refugee-environment relationships: where are refugees and refugee settlements? Through their work with Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT), the author describes the collection of refugee settlement data with remote volunteers and community mapping, and the communication of information to organizations for planning risk reduction and disaster response, among other applications.

Following up on this presentation, I have a few questions for the author, and perhaps for the broader community:

• How involved are refugees in open data collection or local decision-making using these data? Can refugees choose to leave certain settlement features off of the map?
• What kinds of features are prioritized for open data collection in refugee settlements? Who or what groups establish this prioritization?
• Are data collected at the initial arrival of refugees or intermittently thereafter? How does this timing influence the potential for long-term monitoring, especially with dynamic environmental conditions and resource access and use?

Thanks for everyone's continued discussions and interest. We will have our last exchange of the Cyberseminar tomorrow.

Best,

Jamon

--

Jamon Van Den Hoek, PhD | Asst Professor

Conflict Ecology Lab | @JamonVDH

Geography Program, CEOAS | Oregon State University

Oregon State University occupies land in the traditional territory of the 

Ampinefu ("Mary's River") band of the Kalapuya. After the Kalapuya 

Treaty (Treaty of Dayton) in 1855, Kalapuya people were forcibly removed 

to what are now the Grand Ronde and Siletz reservations, and are now 

members of Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon 

and the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians.