District of Lembata is located in a disaster prone area, often threatened by volcano eruption, flooding, and tsunami. This area is surrounded by 5 volcanoes and is near coastline. Because of this geographical hazard, The Lembata’s Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD Lembata) put forward an initiative to create risks mapping beginning with hazard mapping, vulnerability mapping, and capacity mapping that are not yet available in the BPBD Lembata at the moment. With this reason in mind, Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) in Indonesia was invited to deliver training pertaining the use of QGIS and InaSAFE so as to equip the agency’s officials with Geographical Information System in making maps, and in increasing disaster contingency know-how using InaSAFE.

In this training, HOT had the opportunity to travel to Lembata in Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) as part of its endeavour in continuing its support to train the use of OSM, QGIS, and InaSAFE and in enforcing the creation of Disaster Risk Analysis mapping in Waingapu, NTT. This event was organised and supported by AIFDR, Plan, and BPBD Lembata.

Before a map can be created, the base map needs to be completed with necessary and pertinent information. Most participants are from Lembata District where they already have several base maps, containing information regarding topography and rivers retrieved from BAPPEDA, as well as administration, types of soil, and climate information provided by Agriculture Department in Lembata. Nonetheless, information about building and infrastructure was still non-existent. The use of OpenStreetMap to collect such information was still unbeknownst by most participants and thus the training was necessary to complete spatial data about buildings and streets.

Field survey for this training was focused on areas affected by flood in 2012 located in Kelurahan East Lewoleba. Participants were divided into 3 groups in collecting data and digitise them using OpenStreetMap. Most of participants already had prior knowledge in how to use Global Positioning System (GPS) and already had their own unit as their department’s inventory.

The training went well with the participants were all enthused about the use of the tools which usage was trained throughout the sessions. As a follow up, the participants look forward to arranging regular meetings among participants once or twice in every month to further collect data using GPS and to digitise them using OpenStreetMap for villages located surrounding volcanoes. Participants also hope that further trainings can be conducted to enhance their knowledge in the use of OSM, QGIS, and InaSAFE.