KISM - A NEW EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR SURVEY AND MAPPING IN KENYA 
K. Mwero, Deputy Principal - Kenya Institute of Surveying and Mapping; Kenya. 
M. Akiyama, JICA Project Chief Advisor - Kenya Institute of Surveying and Mapping; Kenya. 
Commission VI , Working Group 1 
KEY WORDS: Mapping, Education, Training, Developing Countries - Kenya. 
ABSTRACT 
The Kenya Institute of Surveying and Mapping (KISM), was established within the Ministry of Lands & Settlement 
of the Government of Kenya and is initially to be run as a project jointly sponsored by Japanese and Kenyan 
Governments. The Institute was launched on 1st October, 1994 as a full fledged Government Training Institution 
offering Diploma Courses in Land Surveying, Cartography, Photogrammetry & Remote Sensing and Map 
Reproduction. The Institute will in addition offer Higher Diploma Courses in Land Surveying, Cartography, 
Photogrammetry & Remote Sensing and some specialised short term training courses in related fields. 
The unique feature of this relatively new institution is that it is established within the Survey Department of the 
Ministry of Lands and Settlement. It is thus privileged to be in a position to expose its trainees to real practical and 
actual experiences available in the Survey Department especially during the industrial attachment periods of the 
training programme. In this context it may be regarded as one of the few institutes in the African continent with 
access to such broad facilities. 
The need to develop such a medium type of institution within the Ministry was to produce adequate middle-level 
technical personnel who would satisfy the national demand for such skills. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
Although survey work in Kenya started in 1902 it is not AFRICA 
until 1948 that a department to offer such service was 
established to support the Governments policy of 
maximum exploitation of its Land and natural resources. 
The need for this department was necessited by the 
demand to have Kenya mapped to facilitate effective 
resource distribution and management. The functions of 
the department were (at the time) monopolised by the 
European soldiers whose authority controlled the extent 
to which the land resource was being utilized. 
   
FUN a 
   
Around 1950 the first indigenous Kenyan Surveyors (5 
in number) graduated from the Entebbe School of Survey 
in Uganda. These are people who had been in contact 
with tactical Surveyors operating in the world war II. 
During the same period (1950) the first Survey of Kenya 
Training School was established at Ngong near Nairobi, 
mainly for the European soldiers who were to train in 
Surveying. The new Survey Headquarters was by design 
in-corporating training facilities to accommodate the 
training programmes that had earlier been introduced at 
Ngong. 
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International Archives of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Vol. XXXI, Part B6. Vienna 1996 
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