Report    
Map Asia 2006 Report

The 5th Map Asia conference with the theme GeoICT for Good Governance was an effort to highlight the issue of penetration of geo-information technology within the governing structures. The event had an enthralling inaugural ceremony. The beautifully decorated stage marked the grandeur of the event. The ceremony had Sanjay Kumar, CEO, GIS Development as the first speaker who while welcoming the delegates to the event also made them aware of the worldwide activities of the GIS Development. “We are back to Bangkok with a Bang” was one of the cheers raised by Dr M P Narayanan, President GIS Development for the conference during his introductory remarks at the ceremony. Guest addresses were made by Prof Dr Holger Magel, President FIG and Prof John C Trinder, First Vice President of ISPRS. The Keynote Address at the ceremony was delivered by Mr Kraisorn Pornsutee, Permanent Secretary of Thailand’s Ministry of ICT. The ceremony was presided over by Lt Gen (Dr) Vichit Satharanond who is Director, Royal Thai Survey Department & Chairman, GISTDA.

Exhibition, which spanned over an area of 900 square meters and having 41 exhibitors, was also inaugurated by the Chief Guest. The event was made joyful with the musical band accompanying the chief guest and other dignitaries while they visited different booths. The multiple exhibits were put up by companies and organizations from around the world. The day ended with Exhibitors’ reception and the dinner – the two that served perfect platforms for initial networking, knowledge sharing, etc.

The day second started with the Plenary session on “Geographic Information Trends: Global Perspectives.” The speakers at the session were Prof Holger Magel, Dr Stewart Walker, Dr A R Dasgupta and Dr John Trinder. Prof Magel, while highlighting the three ‘dispositions’ of need of sustainable development, good governance and of ‘its all about geographic information’ put his views on different aspects of four areas viz., Geo-Tools, Geo-Data, Geo-Processes/Geo-Business and Geo-Cooperation/Human Interactions. Dr Stewart Walker, showed the trends of growth of photogrammetry elaborately with bottom-lines as photogrammetry continues to be evolutionary and vibrant and airborne LiDAR is in hot pursuit. Dr A R Dasgupta, Distinguished Professor was of the view that geo-spatial industry has to become service centric and the information provided must be in the form which is readily comprehensible. Prof Trinder presented in detail the advancements and future path for the observation satellites.

The second plenary session was on ‘GeoICT for Good Governance’. The presenters were Drs Sjaak Beerens, ITC, the Netherlands, Mr Johannes Kebeck, who was in place of Prof Vincent Tao, Microsoft Virtual Earth and Dr David Hastings from UNESCAP, Thailand. Issues like, whether GeoICT is panacea and the need for an Asia-Pacific GeoICT congress were the highlights of the session.

The four key speakers from the industry – Richard McKay (Leica Geo Systems), Geoff Zeiss (Autodesk), Mike McGill (Digitalglobe) and Carey Mann from Bentley Systems in various ways dealt with the issue of ‘Enterprise GIS and Infrastructure and GIS Development’ which was the title of the third plenary session.

Richard McKay made a lucid presentation on why and how the gap between the remote sensing, photogrammetry, interoperability and visualization be bridged. Geoff Zeiss, while stressing upon the more responsiveness to customers under sectors of utilities, telecom and local government also presented various aspects of Web 2.0 and open source web-mapping. Mike McGill stated that imagery is becoming an ‘Expected contextual layer for end users’ while putting up his views on Enterprise GIS vis-a-vis high resolution imagery. Carey Mann focused his talk on drivers of change as Diversity, Modeling reality- 3D, Multi-disciplinary, Openness and Workflow.

The last technical programme of the day was the workshop on LiDAR organized by Speck Spatial Tech. The workshop, which had experts (providers) as well as users, delved multiple aspects of the technology that is being more and more applied nowadays for large-areas surveys.

It was the musical and colourful Gala dinner that marked the end of the day. The beautiful Thai traditional performances were interspersed with the award ceremony where each exhibitor was honoured for its participation. The best exhibitor awards were also announced during the Gala Dinner.

The 3rd day

The day had two keynote sessions – a) Large-scale Mapping - Dr Enrico Clerci (Microsoft Vexcel Imaging), Guy Perkins (ER Mapper) and Mark Tuohy (GeoEye) and b) SDI in Asia with presenters as Brig M V Bhat (Survey of India), Ir Rudolf W Matindas (BAKOSURTANAL), Lt Gen (Dr) Vichit Satharanond (Royal Thai Survey/GISTDA) and Dato’ Dr Abdul Kadir (JUPEM).

The rest of the conference days saw series of technical sessions (20 in number) on multiples areas of GIS, allied technologies and their application areas. There were two sessions specifically designed for students that enabled them to present their works being pursued during their courses of graduation or higher studies.

The last day had the second Workshop on Virtual Earth, which was attended to the full capacity of the hall. How well is the technology received and interests people if made as easily accessible and user friendly as possible, was the idea that the workshop gave.

It was at the Valedictory session that the awards for three best paper presentations were announced. Putting his views to the audience, Prof A R Dasgupta mentioned that Map Asia 2006 that witnessed the participation of over 1000 delegates had shown how the vertical domains of Geo-spatial technologies are being developed and new users are thus being created and catered to. The congratulatory remarks were also made by speakers from the government, academia and the industry. The conference ended with the announcement of the next Map Asia to be organized in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The different organizations that partnered with GIS Development were
  1. Co-organiser – GISTDA
  2. Gold Sponsors – BAE Systems and Digitalglobe
  3. Silver Sponsors – ER Mapper, Speck Systems and Trimble
  4. Co-sponsors – FIG, ISCGM, ISPRS, OGC and PCGIAP
  5. Supporting Organisation – UNESCO
  6. Knowledge Partners – CSDMS, GeoICT, UTM and ADPC
  7. Government Sponsors – Ministry of Agriculture & Cooperatives (Thailand) and BAKOSURTANAL
Awards

Three Best Papers
  1. THEOS: a tool to support agricultural policies in Thailand and in Neighbouring countries by Patrick Houdry, Dr. Darasri, Pr. Visharn, Khun Tanittha, Khun Walaiporn and Khun Charin, Thailand
  2. GIS and e-Governance initiative of four Philippines cities by Gabrielle Iglesias, Philippines
  3. Structural Analysis of environmental socio-demographic determinants of malnutrition in Children: A study in Tumpat, Malaysia by Cheah Whye Lian, Zabidi-Hussin Zamh, Manna Wmw, Wang YC, Malaysia
Best Exhibitor Awards
  1. Pasco, Japan
  2. DST, India
  3. Geokosmos, Russia