New InfoAmazonia feature allows users to create and embed customized maps based off available datasets and relevant stories.
An Internews supported project in Brazil has taken a major step forward with the launch of version 2.0 of InfoAmazonia. A new digital ‘widget’ allows for more customized and user-friendly engagement with the interactive mapping platform originally launched in partnership with local organization O Eco last year.
The world’s largest rainforest, the Amazon, is in the midst of massive ecological change. Since its launch in June 2012 at the Rio+20 summit, InfoAmazonia has sought to help journalists in the region unpack and translate the legions of complex data and emerging trends for their audiences at large. It has become a trusted source of the most recent data visualizations, compelling narrative journalism, and open data focused on the nine countries of the Amazon basin.
By developing a new digital widget for its 2.0 version, InfoAmazonia further transforms itself from a ‘geo-journalism website’ to a more interactive platform. InfoAmazonia now offers a series of new options, enabling local media, partner Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs), and all users to customize their own data maps and to make these interactive with mainstream social media channels. Users can also now subscribe to RSS feeds on key themes such as deforestation, mining, oil and others.
“We believe that these new features will open opportunities for bringing more partners to InfoAmazonia and will improve the reach of their data and content about the region,” said Gustavo Faleiros, Manager of the project.
The new data customization options are also intended to reach key ‘offline audiences’, for example through the provision of offline printed maps for distribution to NGOs, civic agencies and even schools.
In a separate development, InfoAmazonia has been named as a finalist project for the Data Journalism Awards 2013. The winners will be determined by an international jury of data experts and will be announced during the GNA News Summit in Paris on June 20, 2013.
Since its inception, InfoAmazonia has now received a total of 27,000 visits and roughly 45,000 page views. This joint Internews partnership project is made possible through the financial support of the UK-based Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN).
