CoastGIS’99: geomatics and coastal environment
tency of data mechanisms for data exchange between organizations;
- to encourage the concept of the common brokerage of coastal data to
facilitate data sharing within sectoral groups and between organizations;
- to improve understanding of the mechanisms and issues that effect
data use and exchange;
- to improve awareness of data types and availability.
Core data sets
Ordnance Survey, the UK’s national mapping agency, has recently signed
a common purchasing framework agreement with nine government
departments including the British Geological Survey (BGS), English
Nature (EN), Environment Agency (EA) and the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF). This is a step in the right direction
towards the provision of more readily available base data sets, and in
keeping with the UK Governments commitment to promoting its
'joined-up’ Government Initiative.
A co-ordinating mechanism?
The Greenwich Project (Office of Science and Technology, 1 999) evolved
from the UK Government’s Marine Foresight Programme and aims to
set up a series of working groups with the following objectives:
- to establish an operational forecast centre and research programme;
- to secure funding to promote co-operation between industry and
academia;
- to improve the supply of graduate and other Higher Education recruits;
- to improve the availability of publicly funded data.
The project is due to be officially launched in January 2000, and is
currently seeking involvement from the key Government Agencies
involvecl in marine science, in addition to other Government Agencies.
Conclusions
Planners and managers need access to comprehensive, current and
accurate information in order to make robust decisions concerning the
marine and coastal zone environment. The CEFAS workshop identified
a lack of awareness and a lack of availability of appropriate data and information, which threaten to inhibit effective coastal zone management.
This needs to be tackled simultaneously from a number of different
perspectives if improvements are to be made.
The role of technology is becoming mcreasingly important as a means
of combating these data access issues, in particular the use of Web
technologies (whether intranet or Internet). In addition, GIS is becoming
an increasingly prominent part of the IT (lnformation Technology)
industry, which is reflected by the fact that mainstream IT players
such as Microsoft and Oracle are becoming actively involved in the GIS
market-place. This promises to promote the development of GIS technologies, allowing increasing functionality not only on the desktop, but
also over the Web. The coastal and marine community as a whole must
63
tency of data mechanisms for data exchange between organizations;
- to encourage the concept of the common brokerage of coastal data to
facilitate data sharing within sectoral groups and between organizations;
- to improve understanding of the mechanisms and issues that effect
data use and exchange;
- to improve awareness of data types and availability.
Core data sets
Ordnance Survey, the UK’s national mapping agency, has recently signed
a common purchasing framework agreement with nine government
departments including the British Geological Survey (BGS), English
Nature (EN), Environment Agency (EA) and the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF). This is a step in the right direction
towards the provision of more readily available base data sets, and in
keeping with the UK Governments commitment to promoting its
'joined-up’ Government Initiative.
A co-ordinating mechanism?
The Greenwich Project (Office of Science and Technology, 1 999) evolved
from the UK Government’s Marine Foresight Programme and aims to
set up a series of working groups with the following objectives:
- to establish an operational forecast centre and research programme;
- to secure funding to promote co-operation between industry and
academia;
- to improve the supply of graduate and other Higher Education recruits;
- to improve the availability of publicly funded data.
The project is due to be officially launched in January 2000, and is
currently seeking involvement from the key Government Agencies
involvecl in marine science, in addition to other Government Agencies.
Conclusions
Planners and managers need access to comprehensive, current and
accurate information in order to make robust decisions concerning the
marine and coastal zone environment. The CEFAS workshop identified
a lack of awareness and a lack of availability of appropriate data and information, which threaten to inhibit effective coastal zone management.
This needs to be tackled simultaneously from a number of different
perspectives if improvements are to be made.
The role of technology is becoming mcreasingly important as a means
of combating these data access issues, in particular the use of Web
technologies (whether intranet or Internet). In addition, GIS is becoming
an increasingly prominent part of the IT (lnformation Technology)
industry, which is reflected by the fact that mainstream IT players
such as Microsoft and Oracle are becoming actively involved in the GIS
market-place. This promises to promote the development of GIS technologies, allowing increasing functionality not only on the desktop, but
also over the Web. The coastal and marine community as a whole must
63