GTOPO30 is a global digital elevation model (DEM) with a horizontal grid spacing of 30 arc seconds (approximately 1 kilometer). GTOPO30 was derived from several raster and vector sources of topographic information. It was developed between 1993 and 1996 through a collaborative effort led by staff at the U.S. Geological Survey's EROS Data Center (EDC). The following organizations participated by contributing funding or source data: the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the United Nations Environment Programme/Global Resource Information Database (UNEP/GRID), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the Instituto Nacional de Estadistica Geografica e Informatica (INEGI) of Mexico, the Geographical Survey Institute (GSI) of Japan, Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research of New Zealand, and the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR).
The Wider Caribbean Region DEM was extracted from GTOPO30 data for CEPNET to provide an Information Management System (IMS) using a Geographic Information System (GIS) software package.
The Caribbean Environment Programme (CEP) emerged as result of many years of work by governmental and non-governmental representatives of the Caribbean community, assisted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). The states and territories of the Wider Caribbean Region have joined in pursuit of a common goal - protection of the marine and coastal environment through the promotion of balanced and sustainable economic development and in the development of an Information Management System (IMS) to strengthen the coastal and marine resource management capabilities.