Harmonizing GIS Education: South - North Perspectives: Lessons learnt from Mozambique, Rwanda, Sweden, and Uganda

The aim of this paper is to critically examine, discuss, draw conclusions, and come up with ideas how to harmonize GIS education in order to realize the envisaged clientele benefits globally. The paper draws experiences and lessons learnt, with examples from ongoing joint GIS MSc programs/courses being implemented in Mozambique, Rwanda, and Uganda. All the five courses (3 in Uganda, 1 in Mozambique, and 1 in Rwanda) are currently financially supported by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) capacity development and institutional development grants. The GIS programmes and course units in the southern institutions have a high demand from clients, especially at graduate level. However, their implementation and uptake is impeded by challenges like credit systems, pedagogic approach, field work, student interaction, and software, which are discussed. It is concluded that there is still a long way to go before harmonization, allowing GIS students to freely move between different countries during their education, is possible. Low/no cost exchange of teachers and “best practice” are identified as important initial steps to reach harmonization, focusing on younger teachers, as well as exchange of material and use of open source GIS software.