Volunteer Assisted International Campaign for Tibet with Verifying and Visualizing their Spatial Data

The International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) has served the vision of the Dalai Lama and the People of Tibet for more than 30 years. As the largest Tibet support group around the world, ICT supports Tibetans in their peaceful struggle for democracy and human rights and seeks to preserve Tibet’s ancient civilization. Through monitoring and reports ICT reveals to the world the truth about human rights, religious freedom, environmental issues, and political conditions in Tibet. At the same time, ICT reaches out to Chinese people to build relationships, mutual understanding and trust.

Across ICT’s four offices located all over the world a core issue is research related to environmental sustainability, climate change and their interaction with human rights. Eight major rivers originating from Tibet provide fresh water to 1.8 people in downstream countries including India, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and China. The Chinese government has and is continuing to build a network of over 200 hydroelectric dams across these rivers in Tibet to export energy to China’s urban centers, among other agendas.

These dams pose threats to the region’s fragile ecosystems, and the rights of the Tibetan people. To help assess these impacts and equip ICT with data for ongoing advocacy, a GIS-based approach was developed. This project culminated in multiple static maps, as well as an interactive platform using ArcGIS Online (AGO) to track dam locations, and conduct an initial analysis of their environmental and social impacts in surrounding areas. The goals of this project were divided into three phases of: 1. Data Collection and Ground Truthing 2. Map Creation, and 3. Training.

Data Collection & Ground Truthing

The data collection phase focused on identifying, acquiring, and validating relevant datasets for the project. The relevant datasets identified as:

Protected Areas (PAs): Due to limitations on Chinese geographic data, multiple sources were integrated to build a protected area dataset, including World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA, 2024), Gillespie et al. (2019), OpenStreetMap (OSM, 2024), and International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD, 2015). The ICIMOD dataset, while comprehensive, can be affected by China’s coordinate obfuscation rules, leading to spatial inaccuracy.

Land Cover: The ESRI 10m Annual Land Cover dataset (2023) derived from Sentinel-2 imagery was used for land cover analysis, boasting over 75% accuracy.

Population: To assess the presence of human populations within the area of influence of the proposed dams, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s LandScan Global dataset for 2022, which is considered an industry standard for global population distribution was used.

Cultural Sites: Points of cultural importance were sourced from the Treasury of Lives website and individually verified by ICT.

Dam Locations: The approximate locations of dams were provided by ICT. Satellite images (e.g., Sentinel-2, Landsat) taken between 2020 and the most recent available images, typically 2023-2024, were used to verify the dam coordinates through a custom Google Earth Engine script.

The transparency slider in Google Earth Engine allowed for visual comparison across the years, and further verification was done with moisture indices and high-resolution imagery, where available. Challenges due to outdated images and coarse resolution were noted, particularly for smaller dams. Dams were either validated, marked as having an ‘unconfirmed location’, or given coordinates of 0,0 for dams with no location information.

Map Creation

Once the data had been collected, the next phase was the creation of static and interactive maps for ICT’s use.

Static Country Map: A national map of Tibet was created to serve as the base for analysis and visualizations in ICT’s dam report, visualizing the location of dams, administrative boundaries, and major watersheds.

Case Study Maps: Case study maps provided a localized view of societal and ecological impacts in areas surrounding each dam. Five major dams were selected for in-depth analysis including Motuo, Gangtuo, Yangqu, Yebatan, and Lianghekou. A 50 km buffer zone was generated around each dam to conduct zonal statistics, evaluating population distribution using LandScan data, and land cover types using ESRI land cover datasets.

Interactive Web Map: Using ArcGIS Online (AGO), an interactive web map was developed that displays the dam locations with associated attributes, including dam size, construction status, and surrounding land cover and population estimates. The map will be added to the ICT website in the coming weeks.

Training

To ensure that ICT’s team can independently maintain and expand on the project, the final phase involved a training program for ArcGIS Online.

Training Sessions: Training occurred during zoom calls and covered topics such as: ArcGIS Online (AGOL) Administration (how to manage datasets, create web maps, and administer the ICT AGOL environment), Map Creation and Customization (how to generate maps, customize layers, and use analysis tools), and Data Management (how to update dam coordinates, and integrate new data over time).

Recorded Material: Training sessions were supplemented with a step-by-step video tutorial to ensure ICT can continue building upon GIS capabilities. These resources will be vital for future updates and further developments in the project. The training ensures that ICT will have the skills to verify dam locations independently and manage and update data within the AGO ecosystem

Conclusion

This project laid the groundwork for ICT to use GIS in their mission to monitor the environmental and human rights impact of dams in Tibet. By splitting the work into distinct phases—data collection and verification, map creation, and training—the project worked to create a sustainable GIS system for ongoing analysis, advocacy, and outreach efforts. This initial collaboration between GISCorps, and ICT represents an important step in the ongoing use of GIS in empowering the ICT’s commitment to environmental and social justice in Tibet.

“GISCorps is an incredible organization providing essential support to organizations like ours that benefit from its expert volunteers and structured approach. GISCorps’ engagement elevated our entire project, opening new avenues for analysis, creativity, and ultimately a more robust finished product able to have real world impact.  Considering the incredible need for initiatives that connect researchers in the NGO community with mapping experts who can utilize GIS tools to turn data into powerful and digestible stories and images, GISCorps existence is a blessing ICT was looking for mapping experts to help guide us through the process of translating our hydropower dam data into maps. However, the barriers to finding and securing a mapping specialist were high – especially knowing where to look and what to ask for, let alone finding an affordable service.

As a human rights monitoring and advocacy organization focused on the persecution of Tibetans under the People’s Republic of China’s occupation, we confront many political challenges conducting research in the field, with particular respect to individual cases. However, when we collect data on broad sweeping changes to land use policies, mass ‘relocation’ of Tibetans, and extractive energy policies, technology can also become a barrier to research and advocacy. Text-heavy reports, while informative, never communicate the scale of a problem like a map and figures deduced from available census and satellite data can.

GISCorps came in and helped us to: define our mapping project goals, connect with highly qualified, professional, rigorous and thoughtful GIS mapping specialists, and helped keep our project on track to deliver the defined goals. I am still in shock that GISCorps exists. I feel both the GISCorps team and the volunteers are doing truly meaningful work to make GIS tools and experts available to NGOs that have the data, but lack the mapping expertise, imagination or funds to benefit from power of maps and remote sensing data analysis. I highly recommend GISCorps and their team to anyone exploring the idea of taking their research to the next level of communication.”

Palmo Tenzin, Advocacy & Senior Researcher

Project completed