Held on Sunday, 9th February, 2020, the SSSI National Bushfire Recovery Map-a-thon was a way for the national and international community to work together to map a total of 2,793,879 hectares affected by recent Australian bushfires with the focus being on burnt infrastructure. Join us for this Webinar to hear more about the initiative.

Speakers:

Dr Lesley Arnold (SSSI National Board Director) will give an overview of the Map-a-thon initiative and discuss overall logistics of planning; industry, government and NGO engagement; the challenges and overall execution of the event.

Nathan Eaton, Executive Director, NGIS Australia will give an overview of the technical set-up of this mammoth Map-a-thon and highlight some of the challenges and triumphs experienced.

This is a free event open to those who participated in the Map-a-thon or are involved in the surveying and spatial community.

Details about how to join the Webinar will be emailed to you prior to the event.

To read more about the SSSI National Bushfire Recovery Map-a-thon see the news item here

Join us for the first session in our ‘Locate Connect’ online learning series! Hear from Scott Dewar, Director, Chris Hewett, Assistant Secretary GEOINT Capability and Development & Phil Shears, Director DEF799 Phase 2.

In this session from 1300 – 1400, the Australian Geospatial-Intelligence Organisation (AGO) will be launching the Defence Geospatial-Intelligence (GEOINT) Strategy, a document that addresses how the Defence GEOINT Community will transform to meet the future needs of the Australian Defence Force. The AGO Executive will also provide an update on their GEOINT projects and announce upcoming opportunities for industry and discuss how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the organisation.

Then from 1430 – 1545, AGO, along with Frontier SI will describe how The Analytics Lab Program (AGO Labs) fits into the bigger picture of AGO capability and summarise the outcomes of their 2019 activities. AGO Labs, coordinated through FrontierSI, is investigating a number of ways to better engage and work with industry. Specifically, the AGO is keen to attract a wider pool of companies and technologies to draw on for automated geospatial intelligence. The primary focus of this program is to address AGO capability challenges through a small number of short-term industry projects, with a focus on machine learning and analytics for producing automated imagery analysis, including automated object classification. AGO will announce a new 2020 program of challenges hoping to find innovative solutions through their partnership with FrontierSI.

The Three Day Mini-Conference will be delivered in July, with 21 speakers over 3 days and taking place for 2 hours late in the afternoon. This exciting event will feature highly anticipated keynote speakers such as Bruce Thompson, Dr Karen Joyce and Nyall Dawson covering topics such as smart cities, surveying, sustainable development objectives, key projects and much, much more.

Wednesday 8 July – Friday 10 July 2020  – 1530 – 1730
Program: Download the program HERE
Cost: $90 – Mini-Conference attendee
Full access to all 3 days of the Mini-Conference, and access to the recording post-event

BEYOND THE 2026 AGENDA

The presentation will focus on a major initiative called the 2030 Space and Spatial Industry Growth Roadmap. The Government has set three key objectives for the space industry by 2030; 20,000 new jobs, $12B additional contribution to GDP and an extra one billion dollars into the investment pipeline. The combination of space and spatial working together will make a great contribution to meeting these targets. The space industry sets up critical elements of the communications supply chains (satcoms) together with content (GNSS and EO). The spatial industry provides the vast bulk of the data infrastructure, value-added content and analytics, and the ‘last yard’ delivery channels to customers. Getting this ecosystem right creates a premium competitive advantage for Australia and greatly strengthens our sovereignty and security. The presentation will discuss the next steps in the development of the roadmap; the development of a white paper which sets out the critical issues, the creation of an ecosystem map will help identify key areas for investment, and a risk analysis that will set out Australia’s critical dependence on space based assets and the steps we can take as a nation to improve our resilience, and sovereignty over, these assets. It will also provide an update on the latest developments of the 2026 Spatial Industry Transformation and Growth Agenda and how this initiative will contribute to the roadmap.

On behalf of the Locate Australia Conferences it is our pleasure to invite you to join us at Locate22, 24 – 26 May in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory.

Locate22 returns to the Nation’s Capital in the traditional format of a live event at the National Convention Centre Canberra (NCCC). With the ability to be COVID safe, within a socially distanced environment, the NCCC is the perfect venue for Australia’s premier spatial and surveying conference. Canberra brings an incomparable setting with iconic national attractions surrounding Lake Burley Griffin and the Parliamentary Triangle.

This year Locate22 will incorporate dedicated streams into the format of the conference. This will enable focused discussion from across industry sectors on how location technologies and practices are being used, highlighting the fundamental role they play in shaping Australia’s future.

Industry, government, non-profit and academics are demanding new opportunities for innovation, efficiency and improved responsiveness, particularly in location-based information. In the past year alone, we’ve seen how location information can provide societal, environmental and economic benefits to our communities.  Recent national emergencies such as bushfires, drought, floods and COVID-19 all have long-term effects on our cities, towns, land, environment and people. These national, place-based challenges require collaborative solutions that must be data-driven, provide insightful analysis, and be easy for anyone, anywhere to use.

Location in Action is about how we learn, share and connect as a community and with end users to drive deeper insights and aid better decision-making  powered through location data, science and technologies.

Come and join us in Canberra where you will have an opportunity to network with national and international colleagues, have direct access to industry and subject matter experts, see the newest technology, and be introduced to the newest ideas in the spatial and surveying sector.

ALISON ROSE

CONVENOR
LOCATE 22

Survey and Spatial NZ’s 2022 conference will be held from 1 to 3 August at the Novotel Lakeside, Rotorua. The conference is the biggest continuing professional development event of the year for NZ surveying and spatial professionals. It invites sharing of knowledge amongst peers, bringing together networking opportunities for all delegates and is an essential event for professional development and connectivity within the sector.

The choice of Rotorua as the location is apt, given the conference theme of ‘Turning up the Heat’. The organisers aim to stimulate discussion regarding challenges in regional areas, which include climate change and developments outside of Auckland.

The 15th International Conference on Spatial Information Theory, COSIT 2022, will be held in Kobe, Japan, 5 to 9 September, 2022. Established in 1993, the Conference on Spatial Information Theory (COSIT) is a biennial international conference series concerned with theoretical aspects of space and spatial information, aimed at advancing geographic information science and its emerging research frontiers.

The conference offers three (refereed) submission tracks with double-blind reviews: vision papers, full papers, and short papers. Embedded in the conference will also be an on-site mentoring program for doctoral students.

Contributions can cover a broad set of conference-relevant themes such as (but not limited to):

• activity-based models of spatial knowledge
• cognitive aspects of geographic information
• cognitive-behavioural geography, naive geography
• data-driven spatial information theory
• geo-ethics and geo-privacy
• events and processes in geographic space and time
• geographic information visualisation and geovisual analytics
• knowledge representation for space and time
• navigation and wayfinding of sentient beings and robots
• ontology of space and time
• place
• quality and interoperability of geographic information
• social and cultural organisation of space
• spatial and temporal language
• spatial aspects of social networks
• spatial decision support, impact of model design
• spatial (digital) humanities
• theory-driven spatial machine learning, artificial intelligence of space
• theories on volunteered geographic information
• theory and practice of spatial and temporal reasoning
• user interfaces, virtual spaces and collaborative spaces

The US National States Geographic Information Council (NSGIC) Annual Conference is the place to enhance geospatial excellence and collaboration for state, local, tribal and federal GIS policymakers and coordinators, private sector partners and other leaders in the geospatial ecosystem.

Providing critical and timely networking opportunities, the conference also offers the chance to connect, collaborate, and share with colleagues and partners.

The agenda will comprise:

Roll Call of States — Where state representatives will share a snapshot of achievements, challenges and upcoming activities.
Plenary Sessions — Presentations by and for the NSGIC community exploring challenges, successes and new approaches for collaboration in the geospatial ecosystem.
State Caucus — A roundtable discussion with state and local government representatives to talk frankly about current pressing issues.
GIO Academy — Leadership sessions and networking for state government GIOs and equivalents only (separate registration is required).
Speed Networking — A fun and fast-paced activity where sponsors, who have allocated points, will rotate to complete the circuit of visiting with state reps.
Annual Business Meeting — Including the election of new board members and leadership transition.
Awards Reception — Recognising exceptional work through the Geospatial Excellence Awards & NSGIC Service Awards.