Manama, Mar. 9 (BNA): The Information & eGovernment Authority (iGA) has participated in Bahrain International Garden Show (BIGS 2023) which is organized under the patronage of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, and supported by Her Royal Highness Princess Sabeeka bint Ebrahim Al Khalifa, Wife of His Majesty the King and the President of the Advisory Council of the National Initiative for Agricultural Development (NIAD), from 9th to 12th March 2023 at Exhibition World Bahrain, in Sakhir.
During the visit of His Highness Shaikh Isa bin Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Isa bin Salman Charity Educational Charitable Trust to iGA stand, the Authority launched the Botanical Atlas project, hosted at the National Geographic Information system (GIS) platform bahrainlocator.gov.bh. Botanical Atlas is one of the pioneering projects of iGA that was completed during the year 2022 and includes a set of vegetation maps, classifications, types of agricultural crops in the Kingdom, along with their areas and locations on maps through the use of satellite images and remote sensing techniques, in addition to the use of field surveys, which contributed to the production of spatial information segments.
iGA Chief Executive Mohammed Ali AlQaed stressed the importance of the Bahrain International Garden Show (BIGS), the impact and sustainability of the event and diversity of its content provided to all visitors, in light of the modern and advanced technologies, and attracting various specialized local, regional and international institutions.
During BIGS 2023, iGA showcased a number of projects, including the Plant Biomarkers project, in which it used remote sensing and Geographic Information Systems to obtain detailed information about vegetation coverage in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The implementation of this project contributed to the production of 48 detailed maps of plant biomarkers at a rate of 12 maps for each indicator during 2019, and the identification of areas that plants suffer from lack of water throughout the year, and areas with abundant water and other outputs such as chlorophyll and nitrogen have been identified.
Al Qaed pointed out that one of the most important outputs of this project is its role in measuring the plant health index in the Kingdom by measuring the vitality and greenness of vegetation cover and the extent of chlorophyll concentration in it, which is one of the most important components of the plant health index, and the types of agricultural habitats such as gardens, parks, shrubs, salt marshes, muddy areas and sabkh areas, in addition to identifying the types of vegetation cover such as trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants.
He also referred to the soil maps project in the Kingdom, in which the authority relied on multi-spectral satellite images, remote sensing techniques and field surveys to produce maps of the agricultural characteristics of the soil, explaining that iGA aimed by implementing this project to identify agricultural areas and areas suitable for construction as well as provide soil maps to government agencies through the national geographic information base platform.
It is worth mentioning that the authority exhibition stand at the event also showcases the most prominent eTransformation projects, eServices and mobile applications provided to the public and business owners.
Source: Bahrain News Agency