Lodz, Poland. On November 30, members of the OSM Polska Association, together with students of the Faculty of Geographical Sciences of the University of Lodz and supporters of the OpenStreetMap (OSM) project, for a total of 38 participants, met in the halls of the university to support the activities of UN Mappers and help them create maps of areas where United Nations humanitarian missions are carried out . Over the course of two and a half hours, the volunteers focused their efforts on mapping areas in a remote region of Somalia.

Last month, the UN Mappers team carried out a series of activities in the Valencian Community, Spain, with the dual purpose of raising awareness of the UN Maps universe and training participants in the use of OpenStreetMap open data. Two prestigious universities, Universidad Jaime I (UJI) in Castellón and Universidad Politécnica de Valencia (UPV), and secondary school students from the Entrenaranjos International School, were involved.

Frans Schutz, Frans S in OSM, is our mapper of the month for December. Frans is a retiree living in Hulst, the Netherlands, devoting his time to validating data, working to increase the quality of OSM, and helping new contributors improve their skills.

Following exchanges between the Geospatial Information Section of the United Nations and the Geographical Institute of Mali within the activities of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management (UN-GGIM), in Africa (UN-GGIM Africa) and of the Second Administrative Level Boundaries (SALB) programme, the offices agreed to organize a workshop for the development and capacity building for actors on geospatial information in Mali.

The State of The Map, the annual, global OpenStreetMap conference, held this year in Florence, was an opportunity to present the projects carried out in recent months and the results achieved so far, but it was also a time to meet the large community of mappers and to discuss and deepen with them topics such as the educational aspect. Let's take a look at a summary of what happened during those days!

Meet our mapper of the month for November. Włodzimierz Bartczak (Cristoffs in OSM) is a Polish mapper who actively participates in his country's OpenStreetMap community and has recently discovered UN Mappers. He is interested in tourism, cartography and new technologies.

Theresa Vieira, a retired project manager living in California, is the UN mapper of the month for October. Theresa, Tess2344 in OSM, has been contributing to UN Mappers' projects for over a year, making a valuable contribution in supporting peacekeeping missions. In mapping, she has found both a way to apply her technical skills and a way to support causes that matter to her.

Bartosz Racławski, “ptarac” in OSM, is our Mapper of the Month of September. Bartosz is a Polish forester, a passionate naturalist and ornithologist who participates both in national and international Openstreetmap humanitarian projects. This month, we honor him not only for the quantity of his contribution, but also for the high quality of them. Bartosz is furthermore an active participant in our Discord server!

Arne Kimmig, AwoowoArne in OSM, is our Mapper of the Month of August. Arne is a German retired mathematician who enjoys volunteering in archeological and humanitarian projects. From the very beginning he made a great contribution to our projects in Somalia, being one of our first contributors and one of the most active mappers in the country.

The UN Mapper of the Month of July takes us to Indonesia! Yunita Sari from Jakarta is an experienced mapper who firmly believes in the usefulness of open data for disaster response. Yunita recently joined the UN Mappers effort in Libya, doing a fantastic job mapping buildings. Let's get to know her!