Implementation of a knowledge‐based agricultural geographic decision‐support system in the Dominican Republic: a case study

Abstract

Effective land use management in lesser developed countries is problematic due to a variety of factors including inexperience and turnover of decision makers, lack of communication among experts in functional areas, and scattered or missing data needed by managers to make informed decisions. This paper describes a “first step” approach toward the solution of these problems that was implemented in the Dominican Republic. The paper introduces a framework used to organize and facilitate the sharing of data needed for land use decision across multiple disciplines. The framework provided the basis for the development of a prototype agricultural geographic decision support system for use in the Dominican Republic. This system is unique in that it combines concepts from semantic data modeling and database design, geographic information systems, and knowledge‐based systems.

The role of information and communication technology (ICT) in mobilization of sustainable development knowledge: a quantitative evaluation

“…However, this method is definitely not feasible for all development partners. In some cases, these techniques fall short in finding remedies not only due to the remoteness of the sink from the source of knowledge, but also due to voluminous information and documentation created over the years in a single organization, let alone in collaborating organizations (Palmer et al, 2001;Duffy, 2000;Silver, 2000;Grundy and Ginger, 1998;Koch, 2001;Grabski and Mendez, 1998;Lau and Lee, 2000).…”

Designing Web-scale geographic search interface for libraries

“…GIS can be used to create maps and reports from spatial data (Van Brakel and Pienaar, 1997). GIS presents a software framework for organizing and sharing data for land-use decision-making across different and heterogeneous systems (Grabski and Mendez, 1998). A geographic information system can be used to standardise document cataloguing (Mehri‐e‐Sedighi, 2008).…”

DSS Application Areas

“…Datta (1995) designed an integrated DSS for generating alternative water allocation and agricultural production scenarios for a semi-arid region. A geographical DSS was developed for the Ministry of Agriculture in Dominican Republic (Grabski and Mendez, 1998). Amien (1998) developed an expert system that assesses the suitability of specific soil and climate conditions for supporting proper agricultural systems, and the selection of crops in Indonesia.…”