Mission Statement

• GMA's mission is to assist aid and environmental efforts by exposing the needs and solutions of long-term poverty, using maps. It does this by training and preparation of sustainable local teams , in advance of disasters, as proven after Katrina.

• The purpose of GMA is to get accurate maps of poverty and disaster relief areas into the hands of aid workers in the field, as quickly as possible, so that they can both navigate and plan effectively, in the effort to save or improve lives.
  
  
• It will do this in two ways:-   First, GMA will meet with the main agencies already in high risk area, to find out what kind of information and maps they need. Second, GMA will send out it's teams of local aid workers to collect data on handheld PDA's. At regular intervals the information collected will be sent rapidly to a mapping base located in the disaster area itself. The data will then be made into maps that can be printed and given to aid and environmental workers. These maps can be also downloaded onto the Internet and made available to aid and environmental workers working globally.
  
  
• Technically, all this can be done but there are stumbling blocks, too. At present, the greatest of these is the need for funds. GMA has had some success in looking for funds from government and corporations in the USA. Additionally it intends to become an "Implementation Partner" to intergovernmental organizations working in a specific disaster relief area. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees is an example of such an intergovernmental organization.

In this way, GMA’ services will improve relief efforts by:

• Establishing a systematic and sound method for collecting data on the needs of victims.
• Providing a way for this data to be shared with aid agencies in a timely fashion, as well as the international community.
• Offering a forum through which credible sources can make their research or knowledge easily accessible to the international community.
• Creating the tools necessary to develop a convenient system of aid coordination.

Our Mission is unique in that we utilize:

• Small teams from and based in a humanitarian zone
• Teams work quietly and unobtrusively, no ‘flash vehicles’
• Local personnel, familiar with their own culture
• Long term missions
• Teams hire local data collection personnel ‘as and when’

 A summary brochure can be viewed and downloaded.