Serena Coetzee

Serena’s research focuses on the ever-increasing volumes of geospatial data, and the management and governance challenges required to make the data available, accessible and usable. The research is of an interdisciplinary nature, combining GISc, cartography, information systems and technologies, and contributes to understanding and solving these challenges in the context of the emerging geospatial information ecosystem, often based on open principles and standards. At UNU-FLORES, she focuses on geospatial data for the integrated management of environmental resources. 

Before joining UNU-FLORES, Serena was Professor and Head of the Department of Geography, Geoinformatics, and Meteorology at the University of Pretoria. She has a B2-rating from the NRF. She started her career as a software engineer on the global software development teams of desktop GIS products. Subsequently, as director and project manager at AfriGIS, she led projects ranging from geospatial data collection, manipulation and maintenance to geocoding, spatial analysis and Internet GIS until she joined the University of Pretoria in 2006.