Geographic Information Systems in practice

Geographic Information Systems in humanitarian and development practice

18.06.2026 | 11:15 – 12:15 UTC+2 (Austrian time) | online (MS Teams)

In humanitarian action and development cooperation, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and remote sensing/Earth Observation (EO) technologies help to decide where to become active, manage logistics, monitor project progress and evaluate the long-term effects. While the UN and INGOs have established GIS and EO teams, the trade-off between the required effort and added value may be less clear for smaller organizations. In this Humanitarian Quickie, trainers Lorenz Wendt and Yann Rebois will critically assess which applications are most beneficial to which types and sizes of organization.

GIS and remote sensing/EO technologies play an important role in humanitarian action and development cooperation. They help deciding where to become active, manage logistics, monitor project progress, and evaluate long-term effects. UN and INGOs use these technologies routinely and have established their proper GIS and EO teams that support work both remotely and on the ground. For smaller organizations, the trade-off between required effort and added value might be less clear. In this Humanitarian Quickie we will take a deep dive and have a close look at the state of the art and critically assess which applications bring the most benefit for which type and size of organization. 

Target group: Staff of Austrian humanitarian NGOs and their partner organizations. We invite Austrian NGOs to share this invitation with their partner organizations.

Trainers

This Humanitarian Quickie is presented by

Lorenz Wendt, senior researcher at the Christian Doppler Laboratory for geospatial and EO-based humanitarian technologies (CDL GEOHUM), Department of Geoinformatics Z_GIS at the University of Salzburg. He has over 10 years of experience in research projects developing Earth Observation applications for Humanitarian and development cooperation actors.

Yann Rebois, Earth Observation Strategist at MSF (Doctors Without Borders Austria). Prior to joining MSF, he played a key role in establishing and developing GIS and EO capabilities within the humanitarian sector, particularly within the ICRC in Geneva.

Registration

Participation is free of charge.

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Please note: Recordings and screenshots may be taken during the event for future use, for example on our website, social media, and in publications. If you do not wish to be recorded, please inform the event manager at the start of the event.

Contact

veranstaltungen@globaleverantwortung.at

This event is organized by Johannes Lins and Ilona Reindl (both Global Responsibility).

A Quickie is a 60-minute online session consisting of an expert input followed by a Q&A. These sessions offer NGO staff a concise overview of specific questions, challenges and solutions in current development or humanitarian contexts.

This event is part of