Annual Message from the Director: CIESIN’s Evolving Capacity Over 25 Years
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An independent expert advisory group commissioned by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon produced a report on the critical importance of harnessing new ways of monitoring and utilizing data in decision making for sustainable development. |
This winter marks CIESIN’s 25th anniversary since its founding in late 1989. Established as a non-profit consortium based in Michigan, CIESIN grew up when the Internet was just starting to develop, when the Mosaic browser was the only window to the nascent World Wide Web. It was also a time when new geographic information system software and data were beginning to emerge as tools for visualizing and analyzing interdisciplinary environmental problems. Over the past 25 years, CIESIN has evolved substantially, hand in hand with the Internet and our ability to marshall the power of information technology to enable interdisciplinary research, support real-world decision making, and promote sustainable development. Since our move to Columbia in 1998, CIESIN’s core mission has remained stable, but our capacity for engaging in research, practice, and education has grown dramatically as part of the Earth Institute. Our staff members teach a range of courses across the University, provide training around the world, and develop and implement tools and data used at local, national, and global scales. We have diversified our portfolio of projects and our funding base, and expanded the core set of socioeconomic and environmental data and information resources that enable interdisciplinary research and applications by diverse user communities. But at the same time, the problems we face locally, regionally, and globally continue to pose difficult and growing challenges for science and society. More
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