By Valrie Grant, Managing Director GeoTechVision
The Fifth Session of the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Manage-ment (UN-GGIM) ends today at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. This session of UN-GGIM, which began on August 2, brings together senior executives from national geospatial information authorities within member states and international geospatial experts from the private sector, non-governmental organizations, international organizations and UN bodies from across the globe. The formal Committee Session started on Wednesday and ends today, but was preceded by a number of related side events from August 2 – 4.
The Caribbean was well represented with over 20 participants from 16 different countries and regional organizations. A special workshop on Standards Capacity Building was planned for the Caribbean Nations and this took place on August 2 – 3. This workshop was facilitated by Trevor Taylor from the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC).
The workshop focused on various Geospatial Standards and their key applications within the region. It identified the level of capacity needed that would allow Caribbean states to achieve fully functional national Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI). Participants were encouraged to examine where