The African Marine Atlas
The African Marine Atlas developed by the Ocean Data and Information Network for Africa (ODINAFRICA) was officially launched on 23 February 2007 at the IOC Project Office for International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange (IODE) in Ostend, Belgium.

The African Marine Atlas, which can be accessed at http://www.africanmarineatlas.net, provides substantial maps, images, data and information to coastal resource managers, planners and decision-makers from various administrative institutions and specialized agencies in Africa. The Atlas indicates areas of intense use along the coastline requiring careful management and provides potential foresight on likely consequences of specific decisions. It has over 800 downloadable data products derived from the fields of marine geo-sphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, biosphere, geopolitical and the human socio-economic dimensions.

Further, the Atlas indicates gaps in knowledge and information base, where additional efforts may be directed. The Atlas will also act in other ways as a guide to recreational opportunities and tourist attractions.

The website is one of a set of Marine Atlas products that will include web data services, web mapping and an Atlas publication when completed.

Primary partners in this project were the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and the African Coelecanth Ecosystem Programme (ACEP).

GLOSS Africa website
The GLOSS Africa website (http://www.iode.org/glossafrica) has been developed by ODINAFRICA in collaboration with GLOSS to provide information on the status of the African Sea Level Network. Information available on the site includes

• Details of planned and installed stations,
• Access to sea level data from various sources
• Equipment types and suppliers
• Reports on installation of sea level stations
• Reports on assessment of potential sea level station locations
• Workshop and training course reports
• National sea level status reports

ODINAFRICA Sea Level Data Facility
The ODINAFRICA Data Facility ( http://www.sealevelstation.net ), is already operational at the IODE Project Office in Ostend, Belgium The roles of the facility are: (i) Data capture via GTS and archive in relational database as an OdinAfrica backup to national and GLOSS data centres, (ii) Web-display (including plots and raw data provision) and provision of tide-gauge operator alert (by email or SMS) in case of equipment mal-function, (iii) semi-automatic data quality control, and (iii) communication with technical consultant and perhaps provide line management. The facility is built in a transplantable format with a view to having it mirrored at a location in Africa. The data will also be mirrored on the respective ODINAFRICA NODC website. The facility receives real time data from the sea level stations directly via GTS. The GTS link has been made possibly thanks to the kind cooperation of the World Meteorological Organisation.

MEDI-Africa
MEDI-Africa is a component of the Marine Environmental Data Inventory, a global inventory of information about marine related datasets developed within the framework of the IOC's International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange (IODE) system. The objectives of MEDI are to maintain a global inventory of data holdings held in the IOC Member States. The MEDI directory has been developed to provide a reference point for locating marine and coastal datasets and will be populated with metadata descriptions of marine datasets from IOC member states. Within the framework of ODINAFRICA all participating data centres in Africa are developing national meta databases describing the data available in their country.
You can consult the African MEDI database [click here]

ARGO
Argo is a global array of 3,000 free-drifting profiling floats that measures the temperature and salinity of the upper 2000 m of the ocean. This allows, for the first time, continuous monitoring of the temperature, salinity, and velocity of the upper ocean, with all data being relayed and made publicly available within hours after collection [click here]