Wilderness 3b: The Guinea analysis

The map in this posting is the results of a calculation of wilderness based on methods discussed earlier in this series using OpenStreetMap data for Guinea.

One of the reasons why I choose Guinea for a wilderness analysis is that I do not know the country. I have not worked with anyone in the conservation scene in Guinea. I barely know the geography of the country. Guinea did however seem to have a decent OSM coverage. It has also had a lot of focus lately due to the ebola virus. 

The above map is based on publicly available vector data from the OpenStreetMap-project covering Guinea. A wilderness analysis based on insufficient data will only represent a map of more or less mapped areas. In this case the basis for the analysis is decent. There will still be many errors. Not to mention that the analysis has not in any way been sanctioned by Guinean authorities.

The criteria used to map the wilderness areas based on OpenStreetMap in Guinea is as follows:

  • Roads: primary, secondary, tertiary, unclassified, motorway
  • Land use: industrial, reservoir, military, farmland, residential, orchard, commercial, quarry, trunk
  • Railways
  • Waterways: canal

Discussion

Obvious shortcomings with this map are:

  • Very variable data. One can easily see that some areas in Guinea for some reason has been very well covered, while others are not.
  • Encroachment categories should have not been discussed and could work differdently here than in say Bulgaria.

The good coverage of data in parts of Guinea is probably due to the Humanitarian Open Street Map initiative where one of the tasks under the tasking manager has been Ebola outbreak areas in Guinea:

The paradox is that the areas tasked due to its vicinity to the ebola outbreak will also have the best wilderness maps.

In other parts of Guinea it is reason to believe that the wilderness map is less than relevant.

3 thoughts on “Wilderness 3b: The Guinea analysis

  1. ragnvald Post author

    As mentioned in the email I am thinking that the TAWIRI-conference could be a suitable place to make a presentation of such work. Depends a bit on this years theme though. TAWIRI tells me they are initiating the program work these days.

    Reply

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