Guidelines for Developing an improved Information provision system in the Geological Survey of Zambia

Abstract

Geological information has become very essential today in Zambia than ever before. This is in the wake of the mining policy that is intended to woo investors in the mining industry. The Zambian government has since 1990 embarked on the Privatisation exercise of all state owned mining conglomerates. This has brought about the need for vital background information for the new would-be investors. The information used to decide whether to invest in a certain mining activities or whether it is worth exploring for certain minerals in different areas of the country. Information held by the Geological Survey Department contains historical facts about the trend of activities that may have been occuring in those areas - borehole data, traverses, geophysical data, geological data, etc.The Information Section has however, not lived to the expected standards. The storage, retrieval and method of dissermination of geological information in the department require complete change and improvement. There has been massive improvements in the GIS community which the storage, retrieval and dissemination of this information must be compatible with. For instance, investors would ask for digital data and accessing such metadata without having to come GSD.The objective of this study are twofold.The first objective is to give asummary description of the current situation of storage,retrieval and dissemination of geological information in the department. This will also help us to suggest possible changes to the information section and provide possible scenarios for change. Then we identify the requirements that the department would require to implement the changes. The second objective suggests the possibility of establishing an Electronic Front Door as a possible way to improve accessibility to the information in the department. Requirements for its development are thus discussed. A number of recommendations to the department for the successful implementation are enumerated. A quetionnare to assist in identifying the main areas during implementation has been given in the Appendixes.