From her Academic background as a Manager of Human Resources, volunteering has taken Nathalie off the beaten path and into the world of social activism through geography and community building.

Nathalie first encountered Openstreetmap in 2014 through the evangelism of Projet Espace Openstreetmap Francophone ProjetEOF, ProjetEOF while she was managing women empowerment projects in Mali for Association Femmes Leadership et Developpement Durable and the Mali chapter of Network of African Youths for Development. The frantic experience of mapathons quickly led her to tutor newcomers and before long she was teaching advanced skills in Openstreetmap editing and QGIS, traveling around West Africa to collaborate with Openstreetmap contributors and cofounding Openstreetmap Mali in December,2014.

Engagement in Openstreetmap naturally made Nathalie a vocal advocate of open data in Mali – she took the Lead of the French-speaking Africa Community for OpenData CAFDO, in Mali in June 2017. She also started her small company DataTICConsultingConsulting, offering bespoke services to private and public customers who wish to build upon tools such as QGIS and tie their business to open platforms such as Openstreetmap.

In her growing portfolio of Openstreetmap activities, Nathalie has nevertheless kept her focus on women empowerment by launching initiatives such as Openstreetmap Girls in November 2015 with women mappers in West Africa – who form a tight community bonded by shared experience as budding leaders in a patriarchal society. With the technical support of Les Libres Geographes, she lead a mapping project called CarteInnov CarteInnov in Mali, financed by the Organisation International de la Francophonie in 14 African countries including Mali from August 2016 to September 2019.

Nowadays, Nathalie keeps a steady regimen of Openstreetmap and opendata projects through partnerships with Academic Institutions, Natioanl and International NGO and Government Agencies and is currently leading the Public Equipments mapping project in Bamako, financed by the Agence De Developpement Regional ADR de Bamako.

To keep up to date with Nathalie Sidibé, follow her on Twitter !