The establishment of IEIMS is crucial for efficient and pragmatic environmental planning and management in EPD. The establishment of the IEIMS will further strengthen, enhance and consolidate the management of existing databases.
The IEIMS comprise an environmental data management system for storing, managing and processing of environmental-related data, and a digital geographical information system for processing, managing, storing, and manipulating spatial related information.
The IEIMS is a reliable ICT-based system with a dynamic framework for multi-user environments and practically user-friendly. The benefits of IEIMS upon full implementation toward environmental management by EPD include detailed and regional environmental assessment & impact monitoring, pollution controls and monitoring system prototyping as well as data management and warehousing.
DESCRIPTION OF ACTUAL SERVICES PROVIDED BY CHEMSAIN:
The solution and recommendations proposed are based on the feedback from the pre-requirement fact finding discussion that were held with EPD and observation of the Consultant in the Pre- URS study.
Environmental solution integrates with geospatial solution (GIS) that offers standardizations and seamless integration of:
- Decision Support System (DSS) for Environmental Assessment & Management
- Geospatial Solution interoperable with 3rd party software and solution
- Document Archiving system
- Centralized Database Management System (DBMS)
Offer seamless data integration with DBMS customization compared with the existing “Off-the-Shelf’ product include:
- User easy access and control via a website. Allow easy control and tracking of the operations of EPD as a whole.
- Customize based on NEEDs. Ensuring proper fitting of the system into the operation flow of the EPD, instead of building EPD into a pre-designed system that may not work in a local context.
- Web-based platform. To facilitate the evitable future growth of EPD as it expands its role and human capacity. A web-based solution like the proposed IEIMS will allow simple connectivity via any standard web browser that is available in all commercial as in the market
- Local support teams. Strength of local support teams means EPD can focus on its core business functions
- Cost effective & high/ fast return of investment. A suite of applications that enables efficient, streamlined data, map and chart with report compilation capability at effective cost. (High/Fast Return of Investment-ROI)
- Reducing data sharing cost. Freedom from expensive and proprietary databases. A solution to eliminate huge up-front licensing costs and ongoing maintenance costs
KEY PROJECT ELEMENTS:
The overall objectives of the IEIMS are as follow:
- To evaluate existing environmental policy, regulation and management requirement
- To evaluate user requirement and procedure flow within EPD for better planning using web-based multi-user access technology
- To provide fast and more reliable Applications & Tools on Environmental Management
- To implement work processes and Database management that is simple, flexible and measurable
- To create a web portal system to enhance the communication between EPD internally as well as with the public
RECOMMENDATIONS:
During the development of the system, a number of recommended actions for dealing with the critical issues with the database and spatial data was implemented. These action areas included:
- Conduct a detailed User Requirement Study to determine the requirement for the IEIMS based on the functions and role of EPD as data information provider taking into account the organizational structure of EPD. This includes a systematic overview of the existing data handling system, available resources, and existing IT platform in EPD.
- Conduct Consultation with the relevant Stakeholders. Relevant stakeholders were consulted in assessing the User’s need and their feedback was incorporated into the final work plan specification.
- Formulate detailed system specification. A detailed system specification is drawn up includes among others, IT software and hardware requirement, networking platform, security levels and other related requirements such as upgrading the Sabahnet leased line bandwidth.
- Strengthening knowledge of User in handling spatial data by conducting workshops on spatial data.
- New metadata standard is developed by adopting the MS19115.
- Environmental Geomatics Data Clearinghouse system is developed as part of EPD initiative for coordinating geomatic data activities.
- Establishment of Data custodian concept to manage and plan EPD data for Environmental Geomatics Data Clearinghouse.
