Mestrado em Desenvolvimento e Cooperação InternacionalThis research considers the theoretical and practical link between long-term sustainable development and disaster management. The aim is to develop a theoretical framework and a methodology which allows the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to manage the related information. Literature review leads us to understand development and disaster management as part of a learning cycle. Within this context, a common approach to information management is suggested to support the decision-making process in a cost-effective manner. A “universal” GIS is proposed to integrate information management for development and disaster while exploring the interactions between projects and project and the related geography which is considered a complex reality full of synergies between space, ecosystem, society, culture and economy. Study of academic production, practical implementations, interviews and a limited GIS application (using ArcMap and QGis) are used to endorse the capabilities of this concept. These capabilities are limited by lack of free information and cost of data gathering, interoperability and other technical issues. Open-source and crowdsourcing may solve some limitations while others need further research
