Students from schools across India showcased geospatial projects on local sustainability challenges at the 5th BRICS Working Group Meeting on Geospatial Technologies and its Applications held at IIT Tirupati. The projects were developed under the Young Geospatial Innovators Programme, implemented by the Bharati Vidyapeeth Institute of Environment Education and Research (BVIEER), Pune, under the National Geospatial Program, Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India.
As part of the programme, BVIEER trained school teachers through a series of workshops on Spatial Thinking and geospatial technologies, equipping them to mentor students in identifying local challenges and developing GIS-based projects through field surveys, GPS-enabled mobile data collection, and spatial analysis using open-source softwares.
The selected teams presented their projects before an international audience comprising government officials, policymakers, scientists, geospatial experts, academia, industry leaders, and start-ups. The projects addressed diverse themes including traditional water conservation, urban water resilience, digital inclusion, household food security, and the circular economy, demonstrating how spatial thinking can transform local observations into evidence-based geospatial solutions.