News in 2019
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Commission 3 Annual Meeting and Workshop 2019
23-26 September 2019, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
FIG Commission 3 Annual Meeting and Workshop with the theme
“Advances in Geodata Analytics for Smart Cities and Regions” was held
within the 1st Romanian Surveying Week, organized by the Romanian
Surveyors Union (UGR) and the University of Agricultural Sciences and
Veterinary Medicine Cluj-Napoca (USAMV Cluj-Napoca) in the city of
Cluj-Napoca, Romania from 23-26 September 2019.
The meeting attracted 130 participants from Algeria, Croatia,
Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Moldavia, Netherlands, Romania and
Turkey. In addition, a record number of 35 Young Surveyors and
professionals registered.
The event addressed the roles of the geospatial community in shaping
the future of urban and regional development. The meeting consisted of
two plenary sessions, five technical sessions, and one interactive
session. In addition to the technical program, dinners, and a gala night
featuring local cuisine and traditional folk dances of Romania were also
organized. A city tour before the meeting with volunteers and a day long
post-symposium day trip to Transylvania villages also enriched the
cultural and social experience of the program.
The distinguished speakers at the opening ceremony and plenary
sessions highlighted the era of change for all professions and
applications of the surveying society. The representation of the FIG
Council by Vice President Orhan Ercan, and presence of past president of
FIG Chryssy Potsiou at the commission opening and throughout the week
reflected how Spatial Information Management is vital for the existence
of surveyors in the dawn of this new era. Speakers covered topics from
the guidance of UN Goals on Sustainable Development and roles of
surveyors to contribute reaching these goals, to issues such as the
changing definition of professions with Industry 4.0, machine learning
and artificial intelligence AI, Smart Cities, Citizen 2.0, open data and
Volunteered Geographic Information VGI.
From the opening and keynote sessions.
The technical sessions provided a detailed look at research and
applications within the fields and interest of the Commission 3
activities including, but not limited to, SDI, data/information
management, open data and provided case experiences of emerging areas.
Innovative solutions for acquiring geospatial data and processing
methods were presented for various purposes. Furthermore,
representatives of companies presented the commercial perspective and
displayed their latest products in the exhibition area throughout the
week.
Some presentations during the technical sessions. Presenters provided a
broad perspective of recent trends and developments within the scope of
Commission 3.
Among the sessions, the youngest WG of Commission 3, Working Group 3.6
Geospatial Next organized a Young Surveyors session. The session was
divided in two parts: presentations of young surveyors’ technical
experiences and geo-innovation followed with an interactive discussion
with the leading participants. This inter-generation session provided a
unique opportunity for networking and learning from each others’
experiences both in terms of technical and soft skills.
Interactive session included online questions from the audience |
Volunteers contributed both to the organization of the event and had
possibility to learn about the recent trends in their profession. |
Group picture of generations
The Commission Chair and representatives were very happy with the local
host’s organization efforts. During the Commission meetings and at the
closing session, various ideas and possibilities for the future of the
activities were proposed which will be evaluated for the next event
series. The young generation of professionals played an important role
both by participating in and organizing the event; we thus believe this
inter-generations approach, which we started in the previous annual
meeting, and expanded with this 2019 meeting, was successful in
producing new synergy for the commission activities.
One of the participants, Leonardo Franchi from Italy, expressed that he
will be returning home with his luggage full of experience and new
knowledge. Another participant, Elias Issawi, from Israel explained the
importance of the event for him as; “beside the new developments in
research and technologies the event let me learn from different
surveying cultures.”. Anca Nicoleta Păvăloiu from Romania, a participant
and local organizing committee member said, “It was a great experience
having both the opportunity to be a part of the organization as a young
surveyor and experience the whole event from the first hand.” underlying
the active participation for the Commission 3 as well.
The Commission Chair Hartmut Müller and Vice Chairs Charalabos Ioannides
and Ulrike Klein together with the Chair of WG 3.6 Cemal Özgür Kıvılcım
expressed their gratitude to the organizers: to the President of UGR
Ionut Savoiu and Tudor Salagean Vice Dean of Horticulture Faculty USAMV
CN and Laura Cocu for her assistantship for organizing the Commission 3
meeting in Cluj-Napoca together with the Romanian Surveying Week. The
Commission 3 once again emphasize their interest and possible areas for
further collaboration and activities to be organized with all the
members of FIG.The Commission 3 annual meeting and workshop provided a
platform to the surveyors for the new century with display of
applications of the geospatial data/information developments and
innovative solutions. We hope all the participants and organizers will
benefit the fruitful discussions for next steps in the region and had a
memorable experience of professional and cultural activities. We look
forward to meeting once again at the FIG 2020 Amsterdam Working Week and
next Commission meeting, which which will be held in Berlin Germany in
October 2020.
Cemal Özgür Kivilcim
October 2019
