Conclusions and Recommendations

Abstract

As noted earlier in Part I of this volume, the keyword in the designated objectives of the 1996 and 2001 NATO Advanced Research Workshops (ARW) is integration. The major diagnosis made at the recent ARW is that advances in global environmental and water resources management are not primarily limited by a lack of data and information but by a lack of proper data and information management. At present, there exist huge amounts of different types of environmental data, which are not merged on a routine basis for the effective production of information. Modern data management offers various ways and tools, such as geographic information systems, to reduce, condense, integrate and analyze such data. Furthermore, modern data types are not limited to routine ground-based observations; they include new data types such as remote sensing data from satellites and airborne platforms and data from real-time sensors and systems, producing high volumes of data. Moreover, numerical models provide another powerful source of data, especially for forecasts and simulation. The availability of such data and the advances in data collection technologies has increased the need for “integration” in EDM systems (see Parts I and V).