Moorea Geographic Information System

Coral reef ecosystems of French Polynesia support a diverse community of inhabitants and resource users along with university-based research scientists and substantial tourist traffic. The motivation behind the interactive Moorea GIS is to improve scientific understanding and conservation of biodiversity and habitats. GIS base layers include historic and modern aerial photographs, elevation model, substrate, and vegetation cover. Environmental data is contributed to the GIS by scientists and by students at the university and K-12 levels. The GIS incorporates ongoing environmental monitoring of stream discharge, sedimentation, lagoon water quality and indicator species, providing the potential for near real-time assessment of environmental conditions.

Initial work has been conducted largely by Eric Edlund (University of Montana) as part of his research project with Barbara Walker (UCSB) in collaboration with CRIOBE. (See Eric's website for the latest geographic resources).   In May 2003, Tim Krantz (Redlands Institute, University of Redlands, California) led a 3-week GIS studio to Moorea and their contribution should soon be available on this page.   Eric, Tim, and others are developing an action plan for the Moorea GIS Consortium. This plan aims not only to put resources online but to address how researchers, students, and the broader Moorea community can contribute and benefit from GIS.   Please contact Gump if you are interested in joining this initiative.
		Click here to access the GIS map.

click here for a sample image

|  home  |  site  |  people  |  research  |  data  |  education   |  affiliates  |  internal page  |

For questions, please contact: brooks@msi.ucsb.edu