6th FIG Regional Conference in San Jose, Costa Rica 12-15 November 2007 – Focus on Coastal Areas, Land Administration and Capacity Building – Topics and arrangements confirmed during an FIG visitSan Jose, Costa Rica 13-17 November 2006
FIG President Elect Stig Enemark and the FIG Director visited San Jose, Costa Rica 13-17 November 2006 to discuss the 6th FIG Regional Conference to be held in San Jose 12-15 November 2006. During the visit the FIG representatives had meetings with representatives of the Colegio de Ingenieros Topógrafos de Costa Rica (CIT), the FIG member association from Costa Rica and Colegio Federado de Ingenieros y de Arquitectos de Costa Rica (CFIA). CIT is one of the five colegios of CFIA. CFIA has more than 11,000 active members while CIT has about 1,400 members representing all surveyors in the country. During the visit the agreement on organizing the 6th FIG Regional Conference in Costa Rica was signed. The theme of the conference was confirmed to be “Coastal Areas and Land Administration – Building the Capacity”. Also the sub-themes and topics were discussed and agreed based on the needs to Costa Rica and Latin America. This conference will be the first FIG regional conference to take place in Latin America. CIT/CFIA and FIG will organize the conference jointly and are looking for partners like the World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), UN-Habitat, FAO, PAIGH and IHO as partners as has been the case with previous FIG regional conferences. The concept of this conference will follow the successful framework that FIG has used at previous regional events. Also registration fees are reasonable (300-350 EUR for international participants including meals and social programme). The joint technical tour on the last day of the conference include a visit to Irazú National Park to see the largest volcano in Costa Rica. During the visit several meetings were hold with the leaders of CFIA and CIT and the FIG delegation was impressed how well the local organizing committee was prepared for the conference. The venue of the conference will be Ramada Plaza Herradura in San Jose offering best meeting facilities for the expected 400-500 conference participants. The conference web site will be opened in December on www.fig.net. During the visit President Elect met with representatives from the Inter-American Development Bank project on “Regularizacion de Cadastro y Registro” (Integration of Cadastre and Land Registration). At this meeting Ing. Juan M. Castro Alfaro, President of CIT, Prof. Enemark and Karen B. Molines, Rebecca L. Morales, Marlon A. Chaves and Isteban G. Segura, from the IDB Project (www.uecatastro.org). The meeting was arranged to provide an insight in the project for modernizing and integrating the cadastral and land registration functions, in order to design some relevant sessions at the upcoming FIG Regional Conference. The key focus of the 100 million USD project is to integrate the cadastral and land registration functions in order to solve a whole range of problems related to the current situation of having two separate and uncoordinated institutions for the physical description and the legal registrations. It was agreed that that project represent a core model for many countries in the regions sharing the same problems as in Costa Rica. This was also the conclusion at the Special Forum organized by FIG in Aguascalientes, Mexico, November 2004 (see Aguascalientes Statement at http://www.fig.net/pub/figpub/pub34/figpub34.htm). The project will have a core role the upcoming FIG Regional Conference, November 2007 that will also provide for the opportunity of exchange of experiences and lessons learnt from other key project in the region. Prof. Enemark and President Castro had also a meeting with representatives of universities from Costa Rica; Director Edwin G. Solórzano, Escuela de Ingenieria Topografica, Universidad de Costa Rica; Lecturer Julio R. Rodriguez, Escuela de Topografia Cadastro y Geodesia, Universidad Nacional, Costa Rica; and Chair Enrique M. Alvarado, School of Topografia, Private University, Costa Rica. The meeting was arranged to provide an overview of the surveying programs that are currently offered in Costa Rica, in order to design some relevant sessions at the regional conference. Surveying education (Topography) was established about 40 years ago at the Universidad Nacional, Costa Rica. Recently (about three years ago) two new programs were established at Universidad de Costa Rica, and the Private University. There is a need for curriculum development to adapt the programs to societal needs and international trends in land management. There is also a need for accreditation measures as well as exchange and cooperation at regional and global level. The upcoming FIG Regional Conference should provide for developing such opportunities. Further reading:
Stig Enemark |
