DEVELOPMENT OF GIS BASED APPLICATION PLATFORM FOR WELFARE OF HOMELESS AND INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSONS

Abstract

A figure of 100 million people was estimated to be homeless throughout the world. 1.6 billion of the population did not have access to proper housing according to a global survey conducted by the United Nations in 2005. Homelessness owes to reasons like rapid urbanization in Pakistan, inadequate housing facilities and low paid or no jobs. Due to this prevailing problem, a system has been designed to create a system for crowd sourcing help from the local citizens nearby to guide and help the homeless and I DPs based on their location to make them self-sufficient. This project is in collaboration with an NGO based in Barcelona (Homeless Entrepreneur) which is now initiating their chapter in Pakistan. To achieve the objectives, an internet based Android application has been developed with a GeoDjango server and a web portal is made for tracking and managing facilities as well as resources by administrative authorities. PostgreSQL Database having social network capabilities is being made use of to connect the community with deserving homeless people. Using this application, the community can help the homeless people to be self-dependent for their basic needs. The product is a GIS based crowd sourcing smart phone application that will facilitate all kinds of donations like cash, clothing, health care services, personal grooming services, etc. In this way, the solution aims at stabilizing the economy of the country.