Information System for Environmental Management

Most of the developing countries have only recently taken their environmental problems seriously. This paper identifies the broad objectives of an Environmental Information System suitable for such developing countries. The system links the various organizations directly or indirectly involved in environmental management with each other and can be regarded as a tool for assessing environmental priorities, generating environmental awareness and bringing together the various aspects of environmental study, such as research, administration, legislation and technical know-how, etc., together for a meaningful analysis The users of the information system, who are also the sources of information, are classified in four groups; governmental agencies, research and technical organizations, citizens' groups and other non-governmental and world organizations. Each one of these groups communicates within itself and with the other three, generating a total of 16 communication channels. The objectives of each channel have been briefly summarized On this user-source matrix, another matrix would be superimposed which would be subject or information matrix to bring out the multi-disciplinary character of environmental issues The information matrix is split up into 9 major components called modules, each one of which contains relevant information for each of the user and is actually set up by the users (or information sources) themselves to interact with each other Co-ordination and consolidation of the existing information centers have been emphasized. Special attention has also been given to the specific problems of rural areas concerning energy, education, health, nature degradation etc. which often get neglected in the process of central decision making. As processing, surrogation, storage and retrieval of information are matters of detail quite common to other information systems, the emphasis is given to the conceptual framework and participation of users and sources of informatio