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Ramapulana Nkoana
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The CSIR is joining forces with the University of the Western Cape (UWC) and the Institute for Geoinformatics (IFGI) at the University of Münster in Germany as part of two initiatives to support the development and strengthening of South African capabilities in geo-informatics.
Geoinformatics is a science that develops and uses information science infrastructure to address the problems of geosciences and related branches of engineering. It combines geospatial analysis and modelling, development of geospatial databases, information systems design, human-computer interaction and both wired and wireless networking technologies.
Ramapulana Nkoana of the CSIR's Meraka Institute is one of the students who had the opportunity of acquiring first-hand experience in the use of existing and newly developed geo-informatics tools and support systems. He completed the UWC's postgraduate course in ecological informatics and attended advanced courses in geoinformatics at the IFGI, one of the foremost institutions in Germany.
As a learner at Mabushe High School in Tzaneen in the Limpopo province, Ramapulana developed an interest in mathematics and physical science. After graduating from the University of Limpopo in 2004 with a BSc in chemistry, he successfully applied for a learnership at the CSIR. During his learnership, Ramapulana also enrolled at the UWC for the postgraduate course in ecological informatics.
"Since I did not study geography at school or at university, this course opened up a whole new world for me, and set me on a different career course to what I anticipated as an undergraduate," Ramapulana says.
After successfully completing his BSc honours degree in 2007, Ramapulana registered for a Master's degree in disaster management at the University of the Free State (UFS). The course offers postgraduate students the opportunity to acquire skills and knowledge to understand and manage disasters and their consequences. After the first year, students get a Higher University Diploma, and upon completion of the second year, students are awarded a Master's degree in disaster risk management.
"I was attracted to the field of disaster management because it uses a
multidisciplinary approach to effectively prevent, mitigate and respond
to the impact of disasters. With the appropriate skills and knowledge,
we can reduce the occurrence and impacts of disasters by implementing
effective initiatives focused on disaster risk reduction, as well as
disaster response and relief," Ramapulana says.
He has already completed the first part of the UFS course and is finalising a research paper on the use of artificial neural networks for flood prediction, focusing on the Msunduzi municipality in KwaZulu-Natal. "An artificial neural network is a mathematical or computational model that tries to simulate the structure and/or functional aspects of biological neural networks," Ramapulana explains.
The use of artificial neural networks is one of the focus areas of the Meraka Institute's research group on information and communications technology for earth observation (ICT4EO). The research group leader, Dr Anwar Vahed, also acts as supervisor for Ramapulana's Master's degree. "As one of the members of the group who specialises in disaster management, Ramapulana's expertise brings an added dimension to our research," Anwar says.
Earlier this year, Ramapulana was offered a scholarship as part of a joint initiative by the University of Münster and the CSIR's Meraka Institute. During his six-month stay, he attended a number of courses at the IFGI. These included courses on extensible mark-up language (XML), the application of remote sensing in earth sciences, geostatistics, semantic interoperability, qualitative spatial-knowledge representation and reasoning, computational data INSPIRE, referencing systems for geoinformatics and geographic visualisation.
"The course in geographic visualisation was a highlight for me. I learnt about the advantages of using a digital map rather than a paper map and how geo-visualisation assists in decision-making, for example, in disaster management."
Ramapulana is grateful for the opportunities offered by the six-month scholarship. "My participation in the summer semester allowed me to interact with IFGI researchers and students in my field, and to share ideas and exchange knowledge with researchers worldwide. I am proud to say that I passed all my registered modules."
Ramapulana credits the CSIR/UWC partnership with the strides he is making in his career. "The UWC is the only tertiary education institute in the country that offers a practical course in geo-informatics, using an e-learning environment. Without this exposure to geo-informatics in general, and disaster management in particular, I would probably have ended up in a very different field of study," he says. "I am grateful to be in a position where I can contribute my knowledge to the ICT4EO group's research activities, while continuing my own learning process."
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