Objectives (II)

The GMES and Africa Initiative is devised for a long-term EU-Africa cooperation on space science and technology to enable the two continents to jointly solve and address global challenges as well as contributing to a more sustainable management of natural resources and tackling climate change based on Space science and technology applications mainly under the Copernicus programme. 

The overall objectives of the phase 2 are:

• Promoting the development in Africa of local capacities, institutional, human and technical resources for access to and exploitation of EO-based services on operational basis for sustainable development,
• Supporting the implementation of the African Space Policy and Strategy, in particular on Earth Observation,
• Providing decision-makers with information and tools needed for the implementation of sustainable environmental policies at the continental, regional and national levels through their Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and Regional Implementation Centres (RICs)
• Maintaining, improving and sustaining access to EO data.

The specific objectives of the phase 2 are (outcomes):

• to improve African organisations, policy-makers' and practitioners ' capacities to design, implement, and monitor national, regional and continental policies and 
• to promote sustainable management of natural resources through the effective use of Earth Observation data to develop relevant operational information services. 

The action aims at:

• Developing a framework for promoting intra-African collaboration and open access data.
• Supporting the operationalization of the Natural and Water Resources Service and the Marine & Coastal Areas Service to adequately provide information to policymakers, scientists, businesses, and the public on real time basis,
• Strengthening regional and national capacities to generate and apply EO-based information,
• Raising public awareness on the critical role of EO Systems and geospatial information in sustainable development.