LMI Participates in Viz for Social Good Challenge for India Water Portal

This fall, members of LMI’s Data Visualization community of practice volunteered their time to participate in the Viz for Social Good Challenge. The team developed a dashboard for the India Water Portal, an organization and website for increasing awareness of water scarcity in India. Prior to dashboard development, most of the organization’s data was stored in long-form spreadsheets and PDFs, resulting in accessibility issues.

The Indian Water Portal requested an infographic presentation in a mobile-friendly, editable format, including some of the following points:

• Per capita water availability in India (for the last 30 years)
• Water use by sectors (agriculture, industry, domestic, and others)
• Water use by source (groundwater or surface water)
• Rainfall trends in water-stressed regions of the country (over the last 30 years)
• Blocks and districts with water quality issues (fluoride, arsenic, iron, biological contaminants, and others)
• Status of groundwater development (critical or overexploited blocks)
• Total groundwater extraction trend comparison (India, China, and USA)
• Trends in borewell and deep tube well structures in India (from the last four minor irrigation censuses).

Through this challenge, team LMI collected and clarified requirements, worked collaboratively and iteratively, and produced and presented a final dashboard that translates data into a clear and understandable data story. Of the 50 dashboards submitted, LMI’s team was among the top five selected to present at the conclusion of the challenge. Click here to view and interact with their final dashboard.

Viz for Social Good is a non-profit organization that partners with other non-profits seeking help with data visualization to increase their impact. Periodic challenges connect a non-profit with visualization volunteers who solve data problems and challenges using a variety of visualizations, data tools, and skills. All skill levels can participate, creating an ideal platform to learn and grow while contributing for a positive social impact.