The FIG Report

Vol. I, No. 6

John D. Hohol, ACSM FIG Forum Head of Delegation

 

This issue of The FIG Report consists of reports of the activity of FIG Commission 2 (Professional Education) and Commission 3 (Spatial Information Management) at the XXIII FIG Congress in Munich, Germany. The ACSM FIG Delegate to Commission 2 is Steve Frank and the ACSM FIG Commission 3 Delegate is Chuck Pearson.

 

 

FIG COMMISSION 2 REPORT

XXIII FIG Congress- Munich, Germany

Dr. Steven Frank, ACSM FIG Commission 2 Delegate

 

The Commission 2 (Professional Education) mission is to promote good surveying practices.  It does so by:

 

• Endorsing universities and other educational organizations to explore the needs of society and to manage in a pro-active way the necessary changes in the “knowledge age,”

• Supporting academic institutions and industry with new methods of knowledge management, helping surveyors continuously to update their academic and professional profiles,

• Advancing educational business and curriculum tuning processes,

• Promoting content development experiences, facilitating international researches in surveying education and training and to initiate joint projects on this field (curriculum development, educational material development, joint courses, quality assurance, etc.),

• Strengthening knowledge transfer between FIG Commissions, inspiring activities on knowledge networks,

• Improving dissemination of information on educational theory and practice to the members across the world,

• Reinforcing contacts to Educational Commissions of International Organizations on the related professions- ICA (International Cartographic Association), ISPRS (International Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing), AGILE (Association of Geographic Information Laboratories for Europe), IAG (International Association of Geodesy), etc..

 

The Commission 2 work plan for 2007-2010 builds on the work plans of previous periods and is tied to the FIG Council Work Plan.  To accomplish the plan, three working groups will concentrate on various parts of the plan.  Working Group 2.1 will tackle “Curriculum Development,” Working Group 2.2 will take on “e-Learning” while Working Group 2.3 will handle “Educational Management and Marketing.” The work will be done under the leadership of Commission 2 Chair Bela Markus of the College of Geoinformatics, University of West Hungary.

 

Working Group 2.1 (Curriculum Development) will work from the premise that new professional challenges require continuous development of curricula.  The opportunities for international cooperation will bring “country-dependent” systems closer together, allowing student and professional mobility between countries.  The Group will work on issues of educational credit transfer, supporting the “Bologna Declaration” (see www.bologna-berlin2003.de/pdf/bologna_declaration.pdf) to allow increased mobility across Europe, harmonize curricula across educational institutions, define a “core knowledge base” of surveying, facilitate development of life-long learning services, and exchange ideas on Quality Management and Accreditation.  There will be a FIG workshop on Curriculum Development June 7-9, 2007, at the Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic.

 

Working Group 2.2 (e-Learning) will explore the movement from traditional face-to-face teaching towards an integrated learning environment, discuss the technical, political, legal, organizational and cultural problems associated with this movement, exchange experiences on content development methods and student support, identify Educational Portal functions, and disseminate Educational metadata about these programs.  There is a planned workshop on e-Learning during the FIG Working Week in Stockholm, Sweden in June 2008.

 

Working Group 2.3 (Educational Management and Marketing) will observe the new challenges of the surveying profession, survey the needs of FIG Academic Members, analyze the market for surveying personnel, disseminate experiences in recruitment and management, distribute Quality Management know-how, and build networks within and outside the FIG community.  There is a workshop planned for 2009 in Vienna, Austria, or London, England.

 

Commission 2 keeps its members undated on progress of the Working Groups though newsletter regularly emailed to Commission members.  The expected outcomes of Commission 2 for the 2007-2010 period will be publications in e-Learning covering e-Learning methods, web services, surveying knowledge pool, and experiences.  There is also a plan to continue developing the FIG Educational Database and to build a metadata base of surveying curriculum and knowledge.  Finally, Commission 2 will develop global and regional networks through workshops, summer schools, and joint projects.  A final report on Commission 2 activities will be presented to the FIG General Assembly at the XXIV FIG Congress in Sydney, Australia in 2010.

 

 

FIG COMMISSION 3 REPORT

XXIII FIG Congress- Munich, Germany

R. Charles Pearson, ACSM FIG Commission 3 Delegate

 

The annual meeting of FIG Commission 3 (Spatial Information Management) was held October 9, 2006 in conjunction with the FIG XXIII Congress in Munich, Germany with a second meeting the following day which I was unable to attend due to an injury.  The meeting was the best attended meeting I have ever witnessed with delegates and guests from many parts of the world.  As always, we were pleased to have Bob Foster participate.

 

A large portion of the meeting was spent in introductions and discussions by the Commission delegates regarding activities in their countries and other items of interest.

 

As the result of a poll of the delegates the annual meeting, which usually occurs between the FIG Working Weeks, was held concurrently with the Working Week in Cairo, Egypt.  Thus, there is no separate report of that activity.

 

After the introductions/discussions, a brief discussion was provided by those Working Group chairs that were present.  The outgoing chair, Gerhard Muggenhuber, then passed the gavel to Chryssy Potsiou from Athens, Greece.

 

Significant accomplishments of Commission 3 during the past 4 years are:

 

Working Group 3.1  e-Government and e-Citizen

·         Encouraged the presentation at conferences to illustrate examples of e-government programs where geographic information is an essential element;

·         Initiated and shaped the Cairo pre-conference workshop “Government for e-Citizens: State of the Art on e-Government Initiatives.”

Working Group 3.2 Spatial Information Management (SIM) Infrastructure

·         Milestones have been the conferences on “Improving the Positional Accuracy of Geographic Information Databases;”

·         A joint workshop with Commissions 5 and 7 on the “Quality Management for Geodata” was scheduled during the Munich conference.

Working Group 3.3 State of the Art of SIM

·         An inventory of “Good Practices within National Spatial Data Infrastructure” is presented at:  www.fig.net/commission3/wgroups/WG3_3/index.htm

·         A joint UN/ECE (United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, WPLA (Working Party on Land Administration), FIG Commissions 3 and 7 conference on “Spatial Information Management for Sustainable Real Estate Market” was presented at the FIG working week in Greece.

·         Contributed to the publication “Land Administration in the ECE region – Development Trends and Basic Principles”

Working Group 3.4 Knowledge Transfer in SIM

·         Presented in a joint workshop on “e-Governance, Knowledge Management and e-Learning”

 

Additionally, Commission 3 participated in a Joint Working Group with Commission 7 on 3D-Cadastre; a Joint Working Group on Informal Settlements; Joint Commission 3 -Commission5 – Commission 7 Workshop "Quality Management for Geodata"; a Joint Working Group with Commissions 5 and 7 on “Cost Effective Surveying Technology and Techniques for Developing Countries.”

 

Commission 3 has also published an annual electronic newsletter since 2002.  Copies are available by contacting Dr. Reinfried Mansberger at: mansberger@boku.ac.at 

 

The following events of Commission 3 were announced:

 

• The 2007 FIG Commission 3 Annual Meeting will be held in Athens, Greece March 28-31.  The theme will be “Spatial Information Management toward Legalizing Informal Urban Development.”
• The two following FIG Working Weeks in Hong Kong (May 13-17, 2007) and Stockholm, Sweden (June 14-19, 2008) were also announced.  A presentation by a delegation from Hong Kong was made during the meeting.

 

Commission 3 has been responsible for the preparation of several publications that have been reported on in previous reports.  Some of the more notable are:

 

FIG Publication 33 - Marrakech Declaration - Urban-Rural Interrelationship for Sustainable Development, 2004

 

FIG Publication 31 - Land Information Management for Sustainable Development of Cities. Best Practice Guidelines in City-wide Land Information Management, 2002

FIG Publication 30 - The Nairobi Statement on Spatial Information for Sustainable Development, 2002

The primary event of the entire commission during the Congress was the presentation and discussion of the 2007-2010 Work Plan.  Since I was laid up during this discussion, I am only able to report on the draft plan that was distributed.

The Commission 3 Working Groups focus on the contribution of spatial information for sustainable development.  The Commission continues to express an interest in:

• E-Government for the citizen.
• SIM Infrastructure.
• State of the Art of SDI (Spatial Data Infrastructure) and GSDI (Global Spatial Data Infrastructure).
• Technical aspects, integration of information, 3D/4D applications of SDI, visualization of information, seamless information management.
• Standardization of Information.
• Geo-spatial policy issues with a focus on pricing policies for NSDI (National Spatial Data Infrastructure).
• SIM applications for environmental protection, disaster management, and risk assessment, social and economic growth, cultural heritage, documentation and development, informal/unplanned, development management, real estate markets, valuation and taxation, real estate financing and development.
• Educational aspects in SDI and SIM, e-learning.

 

Goals of the specific working groups:

 

Working Group 3.1

Based on cooperation with other Working Groups and other commissions,

·         Report on good practice of Spatial Information within e-Government, supporting citizens in participatory democracy.

·         Facilitate experience exchange.

·         Make SIM accessible via the web for the benefit of government and citizens.

·         Provide recommendations within SIM.

·         Provide links to information and publish minutes of workshops.

·         Work out a web-demo if support by vendors.

 

Working Group 3.2

Provide harmonization of data, information, tools, and workflows in components of GSDI within the following policy issues.

·         NSDI/GSDI: Spatial Data + Information Infrastructure modeling.

·         Legal aspects of SIM.

·         Standards Network on international (ISO/TC 211).

·         SIM and LBS (Location Based Services) as tools:

o        Making geo-databases suitable for mobile phones.

o        Improve basic references (geo-referencing).

o        Defining the role of surveyors.

 

The commission plans to cooperate on Spatial Information Management toward “Legalizing Informal Urban Development with UN-ECE-WPLA and UN-ECE Committee on Housing and Land Management.

 

Additional Working Groups will be developed in the future.

 

Proposed topics for future workshops are:

• 3D/4D Spatial Information Management.
• Pricing of spatial data and services.
• Environmental and cultural heritage documentation, development, and protection.

 

The 2008 (January) Commission 3 Annual Meeting is being planned in Valencia, Spain as a joint workshop with Commission 2 in conjunction with the International Congress of Cartography, Surveying, etc., and the National Spanish Congress TOP-CART 2008.