A reference data access service in support of emergency management. Data quality assessment protocol, publication and exploitation of the results.

In the field of natural disasters recovery and reduction and of emergency management geo-referenced information is strongly needed. In my personal experience obtained in the three years period spent at ITHACA, during the shorter at GFDRR Labs and through the work done indirectly with UN-WFP, after a natural disaster occurs, the experts in geomatics are often asked to provide answers to questions such as: where did it occur? How many people have been involved? How many infrastructures have been damaged and to what extent? How much is the economical loss? Geomatics can give answer to all these questions or give significant help in addressing operations in order to get the answers. The goal can be reached both with the use of base reference data, the ones usually contained in the classic cartography, and by exploiting value added information coming from satellite and aerial data processing, classic surveys and GPS/GNSS acquisition on the field. The activities object of this thesis have been performed in the framework of a European project that aim to provide services for Earth Observation: it is called Global Monitoring for Environment and Security. The document is organized in order to follow the project logical line rather than covering the respective timeline.