A Territorial Information System for Ras El Ain region in Syria.

Information is vital to Decision Makers. Political decision as spatial by nature: they apply to population settled in a certain geographical area.

However raw data, the base for any information system, does not have a spatial distribution.

For this reason Geographical Information Systems – GIS -, are important for Decision Makers: spatially structured data allows better comprehension of the reality and therefore better decisions.

GIS are not meant to exist just for producing maps. They are interactive tools that should be accessible to decision makers in a simple way. Without any special hardware and software requirement. Through the Internet, whenever this is possible and convenient.

GIS are normally based on digital maps and specific thematic information. A major step forward is provided by Territorial Information System – TIS. A TIS will include all the spatial information available and relevant to a specific geographic area. It is a platform that can be enriched when more organizations and stakeholders join it.

IT Synergy has provided the project with a TIS platform that includes all spatial information generated and available to the project. This solution is based on Open Source software. It is therefore fully owned and replicable by the Syrian Government without any restriction or additional cost.

No special hardware or software is required for the servers that host the system. Databases can also be distributed among several servers to maintain data ownership and sovereignty.

Any authorized user can access right away the information from his computer, connecting the server through the Local Area Network or via the Internet using his standard browser.

The project staff has been thoroughly trained to be able to maintain and enrich the information available in the TIS ensuring the sustainability of this initiative.

We will be always available to support the Syrian Government to update and expand this valuable initiative to other geographical areas and to enrich it with the contribution of other interested sectors.

Capitalizing on Information

The project has gathered a great deal of information during it's lifespan. Spatial information has been all included in the Territorial Information System. As a way to preserve and lake accessible to all project stakeholder the rest of information even after the project end, we have considered relevant to include all the information not useful for the TIS in a Document Management System where this is properly stored, indexed and can be easily accessed and maintained.

Also in this case, for the same reasons mentioned before in the case of the Territorial Information System, we choose an Open Source Solution. By doing this we are not only ensured that data is preserved and can be used by the stakeholders even after the end of the project, but also that the installed platform can be expanded and easily utilized by multiple entities for their own requirements.

In this case too the project technical team has been properly trained and has now full ownership of the application and of the data stored.