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Mexico:: Success Story:: Environmental protection at SEMARNAT with GeneXus Evolution

The Environment and Natural Resources Secretariat (“SEMARNAT”) of the Mexican Government has been the scenario for developing a tool to support the State’s environmental protection system. It originated in the need to implement the National Forestry Management System (“SNGF”) in observance of an article in the Mexican General Law on Sustainable Forestry Development, in search of a solution to systematize and automate the management of all federal procedures relative to forestry.
The General Bureau of Forestry and Land Management, through its areas known as forestry exploitation, land preservation, forest health, and preservation of genetic resources, along with the national forestry management system and registry, is meant for establishing programs for forestry management and for authorizing the exploitation of forest resources (for wood and otherwise), commercial forestry plantations and storage and transformation centers for raw materials of the forestry industry, in addition to defining notices relative to the exploitation of forest resources for uses other than wood and the country’s commercial forestry plantations, as well as authorizations relating to phytosanitary issues and changes in the use of land in forestry areas, apart from the administration of the national forestry registry. To carry out all these activities, the Bureau consists of 32 federal agencies.

In this scenario, the Environment and Natural Resources Secretariat (“SEMARNAT”) came upon the need to develop and implement the National Forestry Management System (“SNGF”) for complying with an article in the Mexican General Law on Sustainable Forestry Development, where the solution adopted would have to allow for systematization and automation in the management of all federal procedures concerning forestry.

The SNGF, developed with GeneXus - including gxchart, usercontrols and patterns technology – enables process automation in addition to greater productivity, and quicker and more transparent procedures.

IDT was, in combination with official authorities, the software house responsible for developing and implementing this solution that implies a complex project of significant magnitude when considered in the light of the over 7 thousand objects comprising it, its 32 inter-connected federal agencies, and the hundreds of officials currently using the system.

With SEMARNAT’s experience in forestry and IDT’s experience with GeneXus, the joint project was possible with a view of GeneXus’ potential as a development tool with possibilities for quick programming and code generation in various platforms. Niria Mayén, in charge of the computer systems and telecommunications department of the General Bureau, pointed out - among other specific advantages of working with GeneXus - the outstanding normalization of the database, the time implied in development, and the response time to end users for maintenance, as well as the possibility for including new technologies available when developing with GeneXus.

Challenge and Success

Implementing the solution implied certain obstacles like figuring out forestry processes to be systematized and automated, since many procedures were unrelated. This resulted in the development of 74 forestry procedures, which was possible thanks to the active participation of top-rank officials in the project’s development.

Further successful results:

Agile assessment and resolution of forestry matters.

Access, by public services people, to online topic information relative to forestry procedures at the Secretariat.

Issuance of standardized official documents for users.

User’s independence to show output information (documents and indicators) since, nowadays, users are capable of designing and issuing reports on their own.

Improved compliance with environmental legislation, guaranteeing development sustainability for infrastructure development and other activities in the country.

Approval of forestry management at the national level (73 forestry procedures).

Availability of theme statistics which were not available online.

Significant time-saving in queries at the management level.

Control of every procedure and its corresponding administration. In this sense, it is an auditable tool for battling corruption.

How does the National Forestry Management System work?
  • Transparency
The National Forestry Management System (SNGF) is a computer tool supporting procedures to expedite and preserve information generated during the assessment and resolution of actions by the authorities in relation to forestry issues.
Among its main objectives, the SNGF intends to generate a national database, with reliable up-to-date information, and online access towards efficient forestry management, and strong forestry planning and policies, as well as transparent State management.
Allows the authorization of nation-wide processes, data and information.
Allows the generation of various indicators of forestry activity in the country, in addition to information necessary to generate a geographic information system.

Overall features
  • Web environment
  • Administration
  • Dossier entry
  • Theme information
  • Reports
  • Security
  • Indicators
  • Geographic information
  • Digital signature of official documents
Issues addressed

  • Forestry exploitation
  • Forest health and preservation of genetic resources
  • Land preservation
  • National Forestry Registry
  • Integration with ESDIG (Digital Geographic Space)
  • Initial module of citizen services

Features
 
  • Configures catalogues for management based on Mexican legislation on land and forestry.
  • Manages technical and legal guidelines and criteria in forestry and land issues for their corresponding applications.
  • Supports resolutions relative to land restoration projects in non-forestry areas.
  • Registers activities and measures necessary to prevent, battle and control the introduction and/or spreading of plagues and forestry diseases within the country’s territory.
  • Issues and controls certificates and permits relative to the application of phytosanitary measures.
  • Issues notifications for reorganizing forest resources.
  • Registers access, preservation and management of the country’s forest germplasm and historic trees.
  • Based on the SNGF’s data, it will allow the automatic generation of information for publishing the Forestry Statistics Yearbook, along with multiple management and production indicators of importance for decision-making and a proper environmental management.
  • Automatic generation of legal documents and resolutions, standardized for the whole country.

Architecture of the solution

• The application was implemented using a 3-tier architecture on a dedicated application server, and Windows 2003 server operating system with Tomcat version 5.5.25.
• Oracle 11g database dedicated server with Linux operating system.
• Customer connection at national level through Internet and Intranet.


Why GeneXus?

According to Francisco García García, the General Director of Forestry and Land Management, GeneXus contributed to fulfilling one of the objectives of the Federal Government for developing the SNGF. In 2009, the SNGF processed approximately 60 thousand forestry procedures throughout the country. In Niria Mayén’s words, the most valuable features in GeneXus are normalization, automatic maintenance and referential integrity control of the database. This in addition to its capability for integrating routines, external programs, stored procedures, and facility to integrate Java Script code. The authorities understand that the SNGF could be useful in developing other systems within SEMARNAT for the automation of other environmental procedures.
 
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