Lack of roads in Nicaragua have made it difficult to access communities, as well as mountainous terrain, obstructive jungles, religious, racial, and ethnic differences. In 1979, the Sandinistas seized the government. This caused a 10 year war and caused thousands to relocate. The coast’s assets such as forest, fishery, products, mineral deposits, and sea food became very valuable. However, because of the war there weren’t really property boundaries. In the past two years, the Caribbean Research Council (CACRC) funded low-precision GPS receivers, so they were able to set boundaries and profit as well as protect their assets.
The figure above shows the boundaries that were set in the think black bold lines. First they made preliminary boundary measurements. Sometimes it took days to travel because the point was in-between communities and traveling was difficult. Eventually,the 127 communities molded into 30 blocks and created a new Nicaraguan map
Dana, P. H. (1998). Nicaragua's GPSistas: Mapping their lands on the Caribbean coast. GPS World, 9(9), 32-43.
I have acted with honesty and integrity in producing this work and am unaware of anyone who has not.
This is neat! I find it great how we can even use GIS to help solve political conflict in the future. Do you think that with neo-geography becoming more advanced, we won't have to do the painstaking work of mapping out in the field?
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