Geospatial Network

Simba Commences Ground Exploration at Miyove Gold Project

2011-11-03T00:32:00.000-07:00

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA, Nov 02, 2011 (MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) -- Simba Gold Corp. CA:SGD -3.85% (frankfurt:S7G) ("Simba" or the "Company") is pleased to announce that a comprehensive surface exploration program has commenced at its Miyove Gold Project in Rwanda, Africa.

The surface exploration program commenced on October 12th and will continue until early December. The program, consisting of a ground magnetic survey, soil sampling and detailed geological mapping, will provide detailed information on property scale structures which, based on historic information, are known to host gold mineralization. The current program will provide sufficient information for designing a drill program, to commence in early 2012, which will assess the structural continuity of the various known gold zones.

The program is being conducted by UTM Exploration Services Ltd. of Smithers, British Columbia under the direction of Richard Beck VP of UTM Exploration.

About the Miyove Project

The Miyove Gold Project comprises 2,937 hectares and is located in the northern portion of Rwanda, approximately 65 kilometres from the capital city of Kigali. Infrastructure at the property includes excellent road access, water and commercial power access. The project consists of an exploration license issued by the Ministry of Forestry and Mines, in the Republic of Rwanda. The license (license 20/16/03/05) was originally issued August 10, 2006 and has been renewed until March 23, 2014.

The Miyove Gold Project is underlain by rocks of the Central African Mesoproterozoic aged Kibara Belt which extends in a north easterly direction from the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) through Rwanda, to the southern portion of Uganda. The Kibaran geology on the property consists of shale, siltstone, sandstone, and rare conglomerate units which have defined simple anticlinal and synclinal fold structures. Mineralization is associated with multiple NW-SE trending structures hosting gold-bearing quartz veins and stockworks. Associated wall rock alteration is comprised of kaolinization and iron oxidation.

The Miyove Project comprises three mineralized zones referred to as Karenda, Baradega and Masogwe, all of which lie along a northwest-southeast mineralized trend which extends for six kilometres. Three types of structurally controlled gold mineralization has been identified and includes, stringer-vein zones, silicified (quartz) and ferruginous shales, and less frequently, quartz veins with varying amounts of iron oxides and hydroxides (in the weathering crust). The host rocks are commonly shale, and to a lesser extent, sandstones. A forth type of gold mineralization has been identified on the property and includes alluvial and deluvial placers.

The gold deposit type being targeted on the Miyove Project is similar to the Twangiza Gold Mine (Banro Corporation) in South Kivu province, DRC which is also hosted in the Kibara belt. In the Twangiza deposit gold mineralization is hosted within mudstones, siltstones, greywackes and porphyries along the crest of a major anticlinal structure and limb-parallel structures. The Twangiza deposit contains Proven and Probable Oxide Mineral Reserves of 1.13 Moz of gold at 2.26 g/t. In addition the deposit contains a Measured and Indicated Oxide Resource of 1.3 Moz gold at 2.3 g/t and a Measured and Indicated Non-Oxide Resource of 4.3 Moz gold at 1.5 g/t (all reserve and resource numbers are 43-101 compliant and have been extracted from recent reports completed for Banro Corp. and are available at www.sedar.com ).

To date in 2011, Simba has completed 2,300 metres of drilling on the property, focusing primarily on the Karenda zone. Highlights include:

The Miyove Gold Project is being managed by A. Armitage, Ph.D., P.Geol. Dr. Armitage is a Director and the Senior Technical Advisor of Simba Gold, and is the Qualified Person, as defined by NI 43-101, for the Miyove Gold Project. Dr. Armitage has reviewed and approved the technical content if this news release.

About Simba Gold Corp.

Simba Gold Corp. is an exploration company focused on the development of quality gold assets in Rwanda, Africa. Simba owns 12% of Rogi Mining Limited ("Rogi") and has an option to purchase up to 100% over five years. Rogi owns three properties in Rwanda, with the principal asset being the Miyove Gold Project which comprises 2,937 hectares over the largest historic gold-producing area in the country.

On behalf of the Board of Directors

Werner Ullman, President and CEO

Simba Gold Corp.

Source: marketwatch

Russian rocket launches EU’s Galileo satellite navigation system

2011-10-21T04:45:00.000-07:00

BRUSSELS — A Russian rocket launched first two satellites of the European Union’s Galileo navigation system Friday after years of waiting for the start of the program billed as the main rival of the ubiquitous American GPS network.
The launch of the Soyuz from French Guiana, on the northern coast of South America, marks the maiden voyage of the Russian rocket outside the former Soviet Union, with European and Russian authorities cheering at liftoff.

( ESA, S. Corvaja / Associated Press ) - In this photo provided by the European Space Agency (ESA), Russia’s Soyuz VS01 rocket sits on its launching pad, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011, in the space base of Kourou, French Guiana . The Russian Federal Space Agency and Arianespace, the commercial arm of the 13-country European Space Agency, will launch tomorrow, Thursday, Oct. 20, 2011, the Soyuz rocket from the European spaceport in South America, carrying two Galileo navigation satellites in its maiden flight.

The rocket is expected to place into orbit the Galileo IOV-1 PFM and FM2 satellites during a nearly four-hour mission. The two satellites will be released in opposite directions.
“The first part of this mission went well,” Jean-Yves Le Gall, chairman and CEO of Arianespace, the commercial arm of the European Space Agency, said in a brief statement to officials before returning to the control room.
He said the rocket is expected to travel over Asia, Indonesia and the Indian Ocean.
Antonio Tajani, the EU’s industry and enterprise commissioner, called the launch “a great result” that sends “a very strong political message.”
“Europe shows that she is capable of managing a big project just days from the European economic summit,” he said.
The EU had all the pomp and speeches about the dawning of a new age prepared for Thursday, but was forced to postpone it for 24 hours because of a leaky valve that kept a Russian Soyuz rocket grounded at the launch site in French Guiana.
The Galileo system has become a symbol of EU infighting, inefficiency and delay, but officials are hoping it will kick off a trans-Atlantic competition with the American GPS network.
GPS has become the global consumer standard in satellite navigation over the past decade, reducing the need for awkward oversized maps and arguments with back seat drivers about whether to turn left or right.
Now, the EU wants Galileo to dominate the future with a system that is more precise and more reliable than GPS, while controlled by civil authorities. It foresees applications ranging from precision seeding on farmland to pinpoint positioning for search-and-rescue missions. On top of that, the EU hopes it will reap a financial windfall.
“If Europe wants to be competitive and independent in the future, the EU needs to have its own satellite navigation system to also create new economic opportunities”, said Herbert Reul, head of the EU parliament’s industry, research and energy committee.
There are still several more years to wait, but the satellite launch is a major step in getting Galileo on track. It will start operating in 2014 as a free consumer navigation service, with more specialized services to be rolled out until 2020, when it should be fully operational.
After the initial launch, two satellites will go up every quarter as of the end of 2012 until all 30 satellites are up.
The EU hopes its economic impact will stand at about €90 billion ($125 billion) in industrial revenues and public benefits over the next two decades.
The idea for the program first rallied support in the late 1990s, and its development has been pushed back with delays ever since. When it became clear in 2008 that private investors weren’t lining up to finance Galileo, the EU decided taxpayers would underwrite most of the program.
The European Commission said development and deployment since 2003 is estimated at well over €5 billion ($6.8 billion). Maintaining and completing the system is expected to cost €1 billion ($1.35 billion) a year.
Critics have said the cost overruns were much higher.
“Far from celebrating,” officials “who have supported Galileo should be making a public apology to taxpayers for this shocking waste of time, effort and resources,” EU legislator Marta Andreasen of the anti-Euro UKIP party said.
Officials hope to delay the launch of the Russian Soyuz rocket by only 24 hours, although a new date will be announced once the investigation is complete, said Jean-Yves Le Gall, chairman and CEO of Arianespace, the commercial arm of the European Space Agency.
The launch was originally scheduled for last year, but adverse weather kept delaying construction of the Soyuz facility.
Source : Washingtonpost

Rwanda: Mineral Industry Overview

2011-10-19T05:08:00.000-07:00

Rwanda was not a globally significant consumer of minerals. In 2009, however, Rwanda’s share of the world’s tantalum mine production amounted to about 9%, and tungsten, 1%. In 2008 (the latest year for which data were available), the mining and quarrying sector accounted for about 1% of the gross domestic product. About 50,000 Rwandans were employed in the mining sector in 2007. Rwanda’s exports of columbite-tantalite, cassiterite (tin ore), and wolframite (tungsten ore) were from domestic mining operations and reexports from mining operations in the Democratic Republic of the Congo [Congo (Kinshasa)] (Banque Nationale du Rwanda, 2009; Garrett and Mitchell, 2009; Papp, 2010; Shedd, 2010).

Production
In 2009, peat production increased by an estimated 300%, and natural gas, by about 100%. Production of tungsten decreased by an estimated 14% in 2009, and niobium (columbium), tantalum, and tin, by an estimated 13% each.
Structure of the Mineral Industry
The state-owned Régie d’Exploitation et de Développement des Mines (REDEMI) produced columbite-tantalite, cassiterite (tin ore), and wolframite (tungsten ore); privately owned companies, cooperatives, and artisanal miners also produced these mineral commodities. In 2006, the Government privatized 20 of REDEMI’s concessions. The privately owned Cimenterie du Rwanda (Cimerwa) was the country’s only cement producer.
Gold
TransAfrika Resources Ltd. of Mauritius engaged in a drilling program at its Byumba concession in the Gicumbi District from October 2008 to September 2009. In October 2009, Transafrika started work on a resource estimate at Byumba. Kivu Gold Corp. of Canada also engaged in gold exploration. Rogi Mining Ltd. of Russia held the Miyove concession.
Niobium (Columbium) and Tantalum
Columbite-tantalite was mined in the Gatsibo and the Kamonyi Districts by companies that included Centrale Multi-Services SARL (CMS), Eurotrade International S.A., Gatumba Mining Concessions Ltd. (GMC), Munsad Minerals, and Natural Resources Development Rwanda Ltd. (NRD) of Germany. CMS produced at the rate of 180 metric tons per year (t/yr) of columbite-tantalite in 2009. GMC planned to spend $2.5 million on building 10 new small processing plants by late 2014 (Holland, 2009; Centrale Multi-Services SARL, 2010).
Tin
Cassiterite was mined in 26 of Rwanda’s 30 districts. CMS produced cassiterite at the rate of 300 t/yr in 2009 compared with 174 t/yr in 2007. In 2009, NRD produced cassiterite at Ntemba at the rate of nearly 220 t/yr compared with 56 t/yr in 2007. NRD planned to increase production to about 430 t/yr. GMC produced cassiterite at Gatumba at the rate of 60 t/yr in 2009 compared with 10 t/yr in 2007. The company was considering the development of medium-scale cassiterite and columbite-tantalite mines at Gatumba that would increase output to between 1,200 and 2,400 t/yr of cassiterite. Columbite-tantalite prices were $38 per pound in late November 2009; GMC’s expansion depended on prices increasing to $60 per pound (Garrett and Mitchell, 2009; Holland, 2009; New Times, 2009; Centrale Multi-Services SARL, 2010).
Umlhaba Mining of South Africa was engaged in a joint venture with the Government to revamp the Rutongo Mines in Rulindo District. The cost of the project was estimated to be about $5 million (Karuhanga, 2009).
Tungsten
Privately owned companies, such as Africa Primary Tungsten SARL, CMS, Eurotrade International S.A., Pyramid International, Rwanda Allied Partners, and Wolfram Bergbau- und Hütten GmbH Nfg of Austria, accounted for about 50% of Rwanda’s wolframite production in 2007; cooperatives, nearly 40%; and artisanal miners, about 10%. In 2009, CMS produced about 300 t/yr of wolframite (Centrale Multi-Services SARL, 2010; Transafrika Resources Ltd., 2010).
Cement
Rwanda imported 116,000 t of cement in 2008; Ciments du Rwanda Ltd. (Cimerwa) [Rwanda Investment Group S.A. (RIG), 90%] was unable to meet domestic demand in spite of producing at about its full capacity of 100,000 t/yr. Cimerwa planned to build a new plant with a capacity of 600,000 t/yr at a cost of $70 million. In June 2009, Cimerwa was trying to secure financing for the project (Majyambere, 2009).
Natural Gas
State-owned company Kibuye Power 1 Ltd. extracted natural gas from Lake Kivu; the company’s 2-megawatt (MW)-capacity gas-fired power station produced electricity for the local power grid. Starting in December 2009, RIG planned to supply a new gas-fired power station with an initial capacity of 3.6 MW using natural gas from beneath Lake Kivu (Africa Energy Intelligence, 2009).
In March 2009, CountourGlobal LLC of the United States signed an agreement with the Government to extract natural gas from Lake Kivu and to build a new gas-fired power station. In the first phase of the project, the plant was expected to have a capacity of 25 MW starting in 2010; full capacity of 100 MW would be reached by 2012. The estimated cost of the project was $325 million (African Power Mining & Oil Review, 2009).
Peat
In 2008, Peat Energy Co. (a subsidiary of RIG) started peat production at Gishoma in Rusizi District. By October 2009, production amounted to 20,000 t. Cimerwa planned to use peat as a source of energy; the company planned to replace about 70% of its fuel oil consumption with peat. RIG also planned to develop the Gihitasi and the Masya peat deposits (Gahigi, 2009).
Petroleum
At the end of 2009, Vangold Resources Ltd. of Canada spun off its concession in Lake Kivu and southwest Rwanda to a new company called Vanoil Energy Ltd. of Canada. Vanoil planned to complete a seismic survey at Lake Kivu in the third quarter of 2010.
Source: Mineral Yearbook by United States Geological Survey

Forest policies in Rwanda, United States and Gambia win UN-backed awards

2011-09-22T01:31:00.000-07:00

21 September 2011 – Rwanda today won a United Nations-backed gold award for its forest promotion policies, an event that former United States track and field star Carl Lewis, himself a nine-time Olympic gold winner and now UN Goodwill Ambassador, called more important than the many medals he has garnered.
Policies from the United States and Gambia were runners-up, winning joint silvers in the Future Policy Award announced at UN Headquarters in New York by the World Future Council (WFC), a group of 50 respected personalities from all five continents representing governments, parliaments, the arts, civil society, science and business world.
The annual awards celebrate policies that create better living conditions for current and future generations, and seek to raise global awareness and speed up action towards just, sustainable and peaceful societies. This year’s topic was forests, with 16 entries from 20 countries, and the announcements took place under the sponsorship of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
“Despite the genocide and continuing population and land pressures, Rwanda is one of only three countries in Central and Western Africa to achieve a major reversal in the trend of declining forest cover and is on course to achieving its goal of forest cover of 30 per cent of total land area by the year 2020,” WFC Director Alexandra Wandel said in announcing the gold medal for the country’s national forest policy, initiated in 2004.
“The Government of Rwanda has taken a lead in developing visionary forest policy but also bio-diversity conservation, ecotourism, green jobs.”
Forest cover has increased by 37 per cent since 1990, massive reforestation and planting that promote indigenous species and involve the local population have been undertaken, and new measures such as agro-forestry and education have been implemented.
“I kind of know about awards, I’ve had a few myself and I think it’s much more important that we talk about this award because it affects everyone,” said Mr. Lewis, a Goodwill Ambassador for FAO who in his sporting career won 10 Olympic medals, nine of them gold, and 10 World Championships medals, eight of them gold.
“It talks about reforestation and overcoming hunger. So I’m delighted to make the Future Policy Award more well-known and to carry out some of the inspiriting energy of the Olympic spirit that I’ve hade in the past. So I hope that all of you can be inspired to do what you can in your communities and in your forests to make your worlds a better place.”
One silver award went to the US Lacey Act amendment of 2008 which prohibits all trade in wood and plant products that are knowingly illegally sourced from a US state or any foreign country, forcing importers to take responsibility for their wood products.
The second silver went to Gambia's Community Forestry Policy, put in place with FAO support, the first in Africa to provide local populations with secure and permanent forest ownership rights.
Transferring forest tenure from state ownership to management by local communities enables them to reduce illegal logging and forest fires, slow desertification and benefit from the forest products.
“The success of the Gambia's Community Forest Policy proves that even in the world's poorest countries, with the right policies and legal framework in place, rural populations can benefit economically from forests and significantly improve their food security and environment,” FAO's Assistant Director-General for Forestry Eduardo Rojas-Briales said of the tiny West African country.
The Director of the Secretariat of the UN Forum on Forests, Jan McAlpine, noted that the awards come “at a really critical time” because of the downturn in the economy, the needs of dealing with development goals and the complexity of dealing with natural resources and adverse impact of unsustainable exploitation on climate, biodiversity and livelihoods.
Source :www.un.org

Rwanda wins 2011 Future Policy Award

2011-09-22T01:23:00.000-07:00

Rwanda’s National Forest Policy, initiated in 2004 and updated in 2010, has won the 2011 Future Policy Award as the world’s most inspiring and innovative forest policy.The announcement was made yesterday by the World Future Council (WFC) at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
The policy emerged top of the three winning policies which most effectively contribute to the conservation and sustainable development of forests for the benefit of current and future generations.
Announcing the award, Alexandra Wandel, the Director of the World Future Council, an international policy research organisation that provides decision-makers with effective policy solutions, commended Rwanda for its visionary policies.
“Exemplary policy solutions do exist. The Future Policy Award celebrates the best of them. The aim of the award is to raise global awareness for these policies and speed up policy action,” Wandel said.
“We need visionary policies which support a sustainable and just world and protect future generations,” she said

The 2011 Future Policy Award shines a spotlight on the success stories and challenges faced by the world’s forests and the people who depend on them.
The Minister of Environment and Natural Resources, Stanislas Kamanzi, said that the award only encourages the government to do more.

“Rwanda is delighted and appreciative of being the 2011 Future Policy Award winner. This comes as a very encouraging recognition of our national efforts to be part of the global endeavour to sustainably manage our environment and natural resources, ….including through adequate forestry development policies and actions,” Kamanzi said.
“It is equally a renewed and humbling challenge for each Rwandan to consolidate our achievements and to take that to an even superior level”.
The Director General of Rwanda Environment Management Authority (REMA), Dr. Rose Mukankomeje, attributed the award to a number of policies the government has put in place, all aimed at conserving the environment.
“This award recognises our forestry policy but if you look deeply, it also considers other policies the government has put in place including the banning of plastic bags and others, all of which are aimed at conserving the environment,” she said.
Prof. Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, and Founder of the Green Belt Movement, said that Rwanda had laid out not only impressive polices on the environment, but also women empowerment and health.
“Rwanda has sought not only to make its forests a national priority, but has also used them as a platform to revolutionise its stances on women’s rights and creating a healthy environment,” she said.
The award was based on the fact that despite continuing population and land pressures, Rwanda is on course to reach its goal of increasing forest cover to 30 percent of total land area thus achieving a major reversal in the trend of declining forest cover.
Forest cover has already increased by 37 percent since 1990. Massive reforestation and planting activities that promoted indigenous species and involved the local population were undertaken, and new measures such as agro-forestry and education about forest management were implemented.
Rwanda has also been a pioneer in banning plastic bags: in 2008 a bill was introduced to prohibit the manufacture, import, use and sale of polythene bags in the country.
Ahmed Djoghlaf, the Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity and Honorary World Future Councillor who visited Rwanda in February this year, together with Goodwill Ambassador Edward Norton, also hailed the country’s efforts.
“Rwanda is an inspiration for the world. The national policy to heal and restore nature, through a border-to-border restoration program, will create the basis for a healthy and resilient society of the future.
“This policy is placing Rwanda firmly on the map as a global environmental leader, and I hope many other countries will follow suit,” Djoghlaf said.
The first Silver Award went to The Gambia’s Community Forest Policy, which has achieved sustainable forest management and poverty alleviation by handing control of forests to the communities that use them.

Twenty forest policies from 16 countries were nominated for the Future Policy Award by international organisations, including the Collaborative Partnership on Forests (CPF) members such as the UNDP and FAO.
Other organisations which nominate include the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (SCBD), the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), as well as the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ).
Source: The Newtimes

Kigali : City streets to be renamed

2011-09-20T05:31:00.000-07:00

Residents of the 20 sectors that make up the urban part of Kigali City will, on Saturday, propose new names of the streets in their respective neighbourhoods during the monthly community service exercise, Umuganda.
The naming of streets is in line with the urbanisation plan. According to the City Mayor, Fidele Ndayisaba, residents will name lanes in their neighbourhood while the avenues will be named by districts.
“The Kigali City Addressing Project is designed to assist the city, municipal and districts to manage the process of establishing a coherent street addressing system.
We want people to own their neighbourhood lanes, this is why we are engaging them in naming the streets,” the Mayor said.
He added that local leaders have been tasked with passing along the message in their respective constituencies and ensure that the public understands the concept.
The city streets are categorised into three; boulevards which are the major city roads, avenues that connect from boulevards, and streets or lanes that link up from avenues.
Part of the City Council plan is to have street signposts and electronic coded house numbers for houses located along boulevards and avenues.
“We have set a deadline of December this year to have all streets/lanes, avenues and boulevards named; the proposed names will have to be approved by a cabinet meeting,” said Ndayisaba.
He added that, after the initial project, a navigation system, through the use of GPS will be set up so that a person can trace directions online.
The IT Manager of Kigali City Council, Cedric Umuhire, said that the preliminary phase of the project which is mapping is in its final stages, adding that 2,712 streets will be named.
“The urban part of Kigali City has been divided into four zones; North, East South and West that make up 594 villages.
“The consultant has finished the data collection of all zones, the technical committee has also approved the final report of the north zones while training on the navigation system is currently going on,” said Umuhire.
The North Zone is composed of Gisozi, Kacyiru, Kimihurura, Kimironko, Kinyinya and Remera sectors. Sectors in the South Zone are, Gitega, Gikondo, Kagarama, Kicukiro and Niboye.
Kanombe and Nyarugunga are only two sectors in the East zone while the West Zone is composed of the sectors of Gitega, Kigarama, Muhima, Nyakabanda, Nyarugenge and Rwezamenyo.
Sources: Newtimes

US:Department Seeks to Protect GPS Operations

2011-09-16T08:36:00.000-07:00

WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2011 – Defense Department officials are raising concerns that a company’s proposed wireless broadband network would cause harmful interference to essential Global Positioning System operations.
LightSquared’s new terrestrial network has the potential to wreak havoc on GPS systems that are vital to the military and used in a host of applications, Teresa Takai, the DOD’s chief information officer, and Air Force Gen. William L. Shelton, commander of Air Force Space Command, told members of the House Armed Services Committee’s Subcommittee on Strategic Forces yesterday.
“GPS is vital to national security and is relied upon by our servicemen and women for a wide array of capabilities,” Takai said in written testimony.
GPS is the cornerstone of the Defense Department’s positioning, navigation and timing services, and is integrated into nearly every aspect of the nation’s military operations, she said. GPS signals are used to ensure the accuracy of precision-guided munitions, guide troop movements, synchronize communications networks, enable battle-space situational awareness, and conduct search and rescue missions.
“The ability of GPS to operate without harmful interference remains of paramount importance to the department,” Takai said at the hearing.
The military recently conducted testing on LightSquared’s network in concert with the Federal Aviation Administration, Shelton explained, which involved more than 100 receivers from 24 different organizations, and spanned the military, government, aviation, precision, agriculture, automotive and general-use communities.
Test data indicate that LightSquared’s signals interfered with every type of receiver in the test, the general said. Since that time, he added, the company has proposed an alternate deployment plan that would initially use only the lower 10 megahertz of its assigned frequencies.
However, limited testing on this new proposal still indicates an effect on precision receivers and even some cell phones, Shelton said, adding that further testing would be required to fully characterize potential interference.
“Based on test results and analysis to date, LightSquared’s network would effectively jam vital GPS receivers, and to our knowledge thus far, there are no mitigation options that would be effective in eliminating interference to essential GPS services in the United States,” the general told the subcommittee members.
Takai said the Defense Department also is evaluating the effects of LightSquared’s terrestrial transmissions on the military’s use of Inmarsat satellite systems for its data and voice needs. Inmarsat satellite terminals are used by military units, commanders and other senior government officials for global communications.
“The LightSquared terrestrial system will likely interfere with DOD usage of Inmarsat if appropriate actions are not taken to mitigate interference,” she said.
DOD officials would like to work with the FCC, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, and LightSquared to ensure any proposed network alternatives are thoroughly tested to prevent harmful interference to GPS receivers or other military spectrum requirements, Takai said.
Along with the military, GPS is vital worldwide in a wide range of applications, Shelton noted. While GPS is a military-procured and operated satellite constellation, he explained, it’s also recognized as a global utility used by people around the world.
In fact, GPS use is so ubiquitous in the United States, Shelton said he’d put it in the category of critical infrastructure.
GPS is used within the aviation community and by the Homeland Security Department for national border and maritime security, he said. And first responders, such as law enforcement, medical emergency and firefighting crews, depend on GPS to respond quickly to time-urgent events.
“As a nation, we have invested roughly $34 billion to field and operate the GPS constellation,” Shelton said in his written remarks to the subcommittee. “Clearly it has become a global utility serving a worldwide user population.”
Committed to sustaining and improving GPS, officials have scheduled several innovations over the next 10-plus years, Takai said, including three new civil signals, enhanced encrypted military signals, and a new constellation operational control segment, which are scheduled to come online by 2018 and be implemented systemwide over the next five years.
Source : Defense.gov

Rwanda: Minister Kamanzi calls for joint efforts in watershed management

2011-09-15T01:53:00.000-07:00

(R-L)Mathew Edwardsen, Director of African US Forest Service Program, Stanislas Kamanzi, Minister of Minerals and Forestry, and Dr Michel Masozera the Country Director of WLC. The New Times /Timothy Kisambira

African countries should coordinate to develop and promote best practices in environmental conservation, Stanislas Kamanzi, the Minister of Natural Resources, has urged.
The Minister was addressing participants at the ongoing international workshop on watershed modelling and management in Kigali
He observed that sharing challenges would spur the development of appropriate techniques to protect natural resources.
The meeting attracted representatives from the US and 15 African countries including Tanzania, Cameroon, Congo Brazzaville, DRC, Zambia, Uganda and Rwanda among others.
“Many people depend on watersheds. It is therefore important to work as a team to confront the new and complex challenges such as climate change,” Kamanzi said.
“In Rwanda, the current population growth calls for a suitable mechanism to protect resources”.
Organised by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) in collaboration with the Ministry of Natural Resources, the meeting aims at sharing experiences and challenges as well as accessing developed models in watershed management.
The Country Director of WCS, Dr. Michel Masozera, said the meeting also aims at creating awareness, not only on the importance of better handling of land, but also the negative impact of poor land management.
“We developed modules of watershed management and carried out operations in three key national forest sites, including our own Nyungwe, Ruaha in Tanzania and Luangwa in Zambia,” Masozera said.
He explained that the findings would galvanise a baseline on appropriate land use measures.
Some of the participants who spoke to The New Times were hopeful that the workshop would encourage the promotion or development of better strategies to manage watersheds.
“We are facing similar challenges in this field and, therefore, it’s our pleasure to learn and ensure that the skills are taken back home,” said Martin Hega, a participant from Gabon.
Source: The Newtimes

Rwanda: Airforce staff acquire GIS skills

2011-09-12T07:37:00.000-07:00

L-R-Dr Gaspard Rwanyiziri the CGIS Director, Vice Rector of NUR, Prof Musahara Herman and Lt Col Emmanuel Gashayija of the RDF Airforce Unit hands over a certificate to a participant. The New Time /Courtesy

Twenty Air Force officers have completed a five-day training program on Geographic Information System (GIS) with a focus on geo-sciences, photo-interpretation and image processing.
The course, organised by the National University of Rwanda, Centre for Geographic Information (CGIS) and the Rwanda Defence Forces (RDF), aimed at equipping the soldiers with skills in GIS information which are critical in carrying out their duties.
“When you are in an aircraft, you need to analyse the data you collect and relate aerial images to physical features,’’ Lt Col Emmanuel Gashayija, the RDF Air-Defence Commander the told The New Times during the closing ceremony of the training program in Huye District.
GIS is a system designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyse, manage, and present all types of geographically referenced data.
The participants pledged to utilise the acquired skills in executing their military tasks.
“As a soldier, GIS will help me to do the mapping, safely reach dangerous zones, help in natural disaster management and minimise casualties at the battlefield,” Oscar Masumbuko, one of the participants, said.
The university acting Vice-Rector in charge of Academics and NUR, Prof. Herman Musahara, noted that the workshop was organised as part of the varsity’s human resource development agreement they have with the army.
He noted that the military was one of the major users of Geographic Information, observing that the program was generally beneficial to the army in execution of their daily tasks.
Founded in 1999, CGIS serves as a national and regional training and research outreach centre to address the issue of rural sector transformation and poverty reduction.
Source : The Newtimes