We started out about two weeks before and got the ball rolling to map Niger- one of the poorest countries on earth (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highly_Indebted_Poor_Countries).

Apart from some mayor roads and some mapping of the capital of Niger, Niamey, the Map was a blank canvas.

I started mapping in Niamey, a work that has been nicely picked up by other OSM contributors but which is still far from complete. Whoever has an interest in tracing aerial imagery is very welcome to join.
osm.org/?lat=13.496&lon=2.138&zoom=11&layers=0B00FTF

Another effort was made to import POIS from the Geonames Server dataset which is public domain.
There is a gpx file to be used as an overly for your JOSM session see the Niger- wikipage:
osm.wiki/WikiProject_Niger
User dbusse is currently working on a way to make imports a bit easier, he made many small OSM files from the huge above mentioned database, so you just have to do a quick crosscheck with landsat for an exact position and then you can upload the data.

The vmap0 data import (mostly roads ATM- but also places and rivers etc. available)is progressing nicely, but since its quite a bit of data any help would be appreciated. Again see the wikipages:
osm.wiki/WikiProject_Niger

Thanks for all the contributors,

Christian