This is a follow up blogpost to the account of the first week of the beardies in Lesotho as seen here, and covers the second and final week, and significantly, the wrap up of the current MOU through which Fingal County Council provides mapping support to the main body of mappers in Lesotho.

Due to a few problems with our vehicle on Saturday the 10th February we had to cancel a much anticipated visit to Mokhotlong, where some of the local mappers were going to meet us and do a big survey. Instead we all cleared thousands of Mapillary images off the several devices we were using and evaluated how much more was needed for the survey sites.

On Monday the 12th most of the established mappers met with the Local Area Planning trainers Harry McLauchlan and Mark Whelan. This left the beardies with space for another open clinic, which was productive as more people learned the new tagging requirements. On Tuesday the team split up with some surveying Ha Moitsupelis in Maseru and Dave Corley staying at base to show the Environmental Officers of the Environment Ministry how to map. On Wednesday the Environment Officers returned to speak with Mafome about data extraction, and how their data itinerary could be combined with what is already on openstreetmap. Due to poor weather a survey at Ha Phatlalla in Mohale’s Hoek was cancelled, instead a number of staff of the District gathered for a workshop talking all about openstreetmap and #MapLesotho.

On Thursday the schedule brought the beardies and the Local Area Planning trainers together with the trainees to look at the quality of data in the areas they have chosen to do LAPs on. On Thursday a visit by the Deputy Minister of Local Government was well recieved by all, especially as he showed superb interest in the #MapLesotho project.

On the final day in Lesotho a discussion was held of what had to happen in the coming months to enable phase 4 type mapping to be completed in the selected sites, and for the trainees to turn these into Draft Local Area Plans.

All in all the trip was a success despite the cancelled surveys in Mokhotlong and Mohales Hoek due to vehicle issues. The beardies all have returned home and look forward to seeing the local mappers getting a lot done in the next month.