Water SBA Breakout

1. Water SBA Breakout

2. Challenges • Large amount of in situ data in disparate sources • Not all data is readily available or shared publicly • Many users with different needs • Many water community activities within GEO (16)

3. Recommendations - Data • Recommend and encourage standardization protocols for in situ data collection • Identify the current defacto data repositories and work to promote those data sources and encourage “homeless” data to be deposited in those repositories • Continue to encourage sharing of data • Encourage GCI functionality in GCI to convert in situ water data into a standardized output format that is interoperable with satellite and other Earth observation data and potentially also socio economic data

4. Recommendations – users • Identify and focus on commonalities between users and what is already being done to produce user services • Identify current capacity building efforts that are underway and share best efforts and collaborate on future activities • Develop and conduct capacity building in local languages

5. Recommendations – coordination • Open invitation from GEO Global Water Security Initiative (GEOGloWs) for freshwater community activities to affiliate with the initiative • Share best practices • Coordinate and leverage capacity building activities • Reduce risk for duplication of efforts • Blue Planet Initiative aiming to coordinate the marine, coastal and Great Lakes water activities – invites new GEO activities to affiliate with the initiative • Share best practices • Coordinate and leverage capacity building activities • Reduce risk for duplication of efforts