Geospatial Data Uploads

Geospatial data allows researchers to analyze health information with a location component- from mapping disease outbreak to understanding healthcare access across different regions. The CEMA warehouse uspports various geospatial data formarts to help ypu visualize and analyze location-based health data across Kenya.

What you can upload

Vector Data (Shapefiles)

• Health facility locations - hospitals, clinics, community health units
• Administrative boundaries - counties, wards, health zones
• Disease outbreak areas - affected regions during epidemics
• Transportation networks - roads affecting healthcare access

Raster Data (Grid/Image Data)

• Population density maps - showing where people live
• Environmental data - rainfall, temperature, elevation
• Disease risk maps - malaria risk zones, habitat suitability maps, pollution levels
• Land use patterns - urban/rural classification

Shapefile Upload

Shapefiles are the most common format for geospatial data. Think of them like a digital map that contains both the shapes (boundaries, points) and information about those shapes (names, statistics).

📁 Required Files:
  ├── dataset.shp    (main shapefile)
  ├── dataset.dbf    (attribute database)
  ├── dataset.shx    (shape index)
  └── dataset.prj    (projection info - recommended)

Best Practices:

• Zip all related files together
• Use consistent naming conventions
• Include projection information (.prj file)
• Document coordinate system used

Raster Data Upload

Raster data is like a digital photograph of the earth where each pixel conatins information ( like population count or rainfall ammount)

• Ensure proper georeferencing
• Include metadata about resolution and coordinate system and what the data represents
• Compress large files when possible - to reduce upload times over the server
• For multi-band raster, upload it as a zipped file
• Document data units and scaling factors

Raster upload page is quite easy and user friendly as shown in the imag ebelow:

Steps:

• Navigate to the rasters upload interface
• Select a category the upload belongs to - For now we have one broad category Geospatial data

Choose appropriate access level:

• Public - Available to all users (recommended for most data)
• Restricted - Requires CEMA account to access. And for people outside CEMA, please contact for support

Then:

• Add a description of the data - Include metadata about resolution, what the data represents, the coordinate system, data units (5 by 5 km etc), the data source and methods used.
• For multi-band rasters, upload as zipped file
• Click upload - This may take a while depending on the size of the raster file being uploaded.

Supported File Formats

Format	Extension	Best For	Notes
Shapefile	.shp, .dbf, .shx, .prj	Boundaries, points, lines	Most common, upload as zip
GeoTIFF	.tif, .tiff	Satellite imagery, grids	Include coordinate info
GeoJSON	.geojson	Web mapping	Lightweight, good for sharing

---

Need help? Contact or consult the documentation sections for detailed guidance on specific tasks.