Standardisation in Mapping and Monitoring of Invasive Alien Plant Species

The control and eradication of invasive alien plants in South Africa where about 10.1 million hectares of land has been invaded requires information about their extent and distribution. In this study it has been shown that in order to effectively and economically control invasive alien plants in the St. Lucia Heritage Site, the Working for Water organisation requires data on the extent and distribution of invasion not only of its operational areas but also of the surrounding areas. Information on extent and distribution requires compiling data from multiple sources. Multi source data integration has been shown to be a troublesome exercise due to differences in methods in data acquisition, representation, coding, classification, scales, map projections, and mapping formats. Such data integration can only be made possible when organizations with a common goal adopt a common approach that would facilitate sharing data and information. In this study it has also been shown that multi-source alien species data integration and comparability of data amongst organizations was made possible through the adoption and successful implementation of data formats, data exchange, and user design standards.