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Opening Plenary.
Jack Dangermond, President of ESRI.
Preetha Pulusani, President of Intergraph Mapping and Geospatial
Solutions.
Dr Ian Masser, Past President of GSDI and Dr.
Mukund Rao,
new President of GSDI.
Prof.
Fraser Taylor, President of ISCGM and Dr. Hiromichi
Maruyama, Secretary General of ISCGM. |
The 7th International Conference on Global
Spatial Data Infrastructure (GSDI-7) “SDI for Sustainable Future”
was held in Bangalore, India February 2-6, 2004. In conjunction to
GSDI-7 also the 11th Meeting of the International Steering Committee of
Global Mapping took place February 7, 2004. Further the Permanent
Committee on GIS Infrastructure for Asia and the Pacific (PCGIAP) had
its 10th Annual Meeting in Bangalore. In the GSDI programme there were
also two days reserved for pre-conference tutorials. Finally some
participants visited Map India 2004 in New Delhi on their way to
Bangalore, so the sample of events offered an excellent opportunity for
overseas visitors to learn about the progress in SDI business in India
during the last years. GSDI-7 was organized by the Indian Space Research
Organisation (ISRO) and the Department of Science and Technology,
Government of India and it was co-hosted by the Survey of India.
For GSDI the meetings in Bangalore were the first administrative
meetings after GSDI was formally established and registered in USA in
2003. At the moment GSDI has more than 35 institutional members, in
addition it has individual members and sustaining members. The new Board
of GSDI consists of 19 members representing different regions and actors
within GSDI. The new president following Dr. Ian Masser is Dr. Mukund Rao from India, who will be the president until the next GSDI
conference in 2005. The President-Elect is Harlan Onsrud from
USA. GSDI is also considering moving its permanent secretariat from the
United States to Bangalore, India.
Markku Villikka, Director, FIG office attended the Board
Meeting of GSDI and the Board Meeting of the ISCGM. The main purpose of
his visit was to get familiar with the arrangements of the GSDI
conferences and to discuss future co-operation with international
associations within the SDI. The actual reason for the visit was to
agree on the arrangements for the joint FIG Working Week and GSDI-8 that
will be held in Cairo, Egypt April 16-21, 2005. The GSDI conference
confirmed that the next GSDI would be held together with FIG. This will
also be the first time for FIG to organise its Annual Conference
together with another international organization. ISCGM is also
considering having its annual meeting in Cairo.
At the GSDI-7 there were totally 375 delegates from almost 40
countries, which is an all time record – number of international
delegates exceeded 150. The commercial exhibition was larger than at the
FIG working weeks. Platinum sponsors of the conference were Intergraph,
ESRI and Space Image. In the technical programme there were, in addition
to the opening session, 8 plenary sessions and panels and 9 parallel
sessions. Further an exhibition for posters was organised. Totally more
than 120 papers are included in the proceedings. The main themes
included: international SDI initiatives, national SDI programmes, SDI
for sustainable future, societal relevance of SDI, economic, financial
and legal issues of SDI, education and curricula and images, GIS and
GPS.
At the opening plenary session keynote presentations were given by
Jack Dangermond, President of ESRI, Preetha Pulusani,
President of Intergraph Mapping and Geospatial Solutions (she originally
comes from Bangalore) and Mark Reichardt, Open GIS Consortium.
More about the GSDI-7:
http://www.gsdi7.org.in/
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