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Tag: UNSD

  • UN, Geospatial Media cooperate on geospatial infrastructure

    Letter signed to advance role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy

    Geospatial Media & Communications has signed a letter of cooperation with the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) to work together to advance the role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy.

    Consistent with their respective mandates, the UNSD and Geospatial Media will collaborate to carry out activities related to their common objective of demonstrating the value of global geospatial knowledge, the data ecosystem, public-private partnerships, and their contribution towards building Geospatial Knowledge Infrastructure and the Global Development Agendas.

    The agreement was signed by Stefan Schweinfest, director, UNSD, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and Sanjay Kumar, CEO, Geospatial Media, in New York on Oct. 31.

    “The United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda is ambitious and requires countries to have solid national information systems to successfully stir the process of implementation. It is a central task of my office, the United Nations Statistics Division, to support countries in building the necessary national information capacities, both in the area of statistics and geospatial information. For this challenging task we need the cooperation of the private sector through well established public-private partnerships. Geospatial Media & Communications is a unique partner in this respect, due to its global reach and its in-depth knowledge and understanding of country needs. I am, therefore, delighted to cooperate with them closely in the coming years,” said Mr. Schweinfest.

    “Pursuing its vision to make a difference through geospatial knowledge in world economy nad society, Geospatial Media has been evangelizing geospatial industry globally for over two decades through research, advocacy, media and knowledge exchange platforms. It has contributed in the formation and strengthening of several institutions, including the Association of Geospatial Industries (AGI), World Geospatial Industry Council (WGIC), UNGGIM Private Sector Network and the National Think Tank on Geospatial Strategy for New India. Through this collaboration, our intent is to further our vision to showcase high level value of geospatial knowledge in global development agenda and facilitate alignment and evolution of geospatial stakeholders with emerging socio-economic development models in the fourth Industrial age,” said Mr. Sanjay Kumar.

    The intended collaboration will focus on a number of common objectives at national, regional and global levels which will include:

    1. Working together to create joint programs and projects to develop geospatial knowledge infrastructure, networks and human resource capacities;
    2. Assessment of the prospective role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy;
    3. Collaboratively developing broader methods, guidelines, architectures and policy frameworks for the adoption, utilisation and benefits of geospatial knowledge infrastructure;
    4. Develop documents, training modules and other resources to assist National Geospatial Information Agencies in their transformation and modernization aspirations in alignment with the national to global vision of the Integrated Geospatial Information Framework;
    5. Facilitate a collaborative knowledge exchange and engagement atmosphere between the commercial geospatial industry, national geospatial agencies, and the broader user industries and civil society, towards developing public-private partnership models for co-creating geospatial knowledge infrastructure and strengthening of industry and institutional capacities; and
    6. Advocate, communicate and promote the value and utility of geospatial information and enabling technologies for sustainable development.

  • UN, Geospatial Media cooperate on geospatial infrastructure

    Letter signed to advance role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy

    Geospatial Media & Communications has signed a letter of cooperation with the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) to work together to advance the role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy.

    Consistent with their respective mandates, the UNSD and Geospatial Media will collaborate to carry out activities related to their common objective of demonstrating the value of global geospatial knowledge, the data ecosystem, public-private partnerships, and their contribution towards building Geospatial Knowledge Infrastructure and the Global Development Agendas.

    The agreement was signed by Stefan Schweinfest, director, UNSD, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and Sanjay Kumar, CEO, Geospatial Media, in New York on Oct. 31.

    “The United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda is ambitious and requires countries to have solid national information systems to successfully stir the process of implementation. It is a central task of my office, the United Nations Statistics Division, to support countries in building the necessary national information capacities, both in the area of statistics and geospatial information. For this challenging task we need the cooperation of the private sector through well established public-private partnerships. Geospatial Media & Communications is a unique partner in this respect, due to its global reach and its in-depth knowledge and understanding of country needs. I am, therefore, delighted to cooperate with them closely in the coming years,” said Mr. Schweinfest.

    “Pursuing its vision to make a difference through geospatial knowledge in world economy nad society, Geospatial Media has been evangelizing geospatial industry globally for over two decades through research, advocacy, media and knowledge exchange platforms. It has contributed in the formation and strengthening of several institutions, including the Association of Geospatial Industries (AGI), World Geospatial Industry Council (WGIC), UNGGIM Private Sector Network and the National Think Tank on Geospatial Strategy for New India. Through this collaboration, our intent is to further our vision to showcase high level value of geospatial knowledge in global development agenda and facilitate alignment and evolution of geospatial stakeholders with emerging socio-economic development models in the fourth Industrial age,” said Mr. Sanjay Kumar.

    The intended collaboration will focus on a number of common objectives at national, regional and global levels which will include:

    1. Working together to create joint programs and projects to develop geospatial knowledge infrastructure, networks and human resource capacities;
    2. Assessment of the prospective role of geospatial knowledge infrastructure in global society and economy;
    3. Collaboratively developing broader methods, guidelines, architectures and policy frameworks for the adoption, utilisation and benefits of geospatial knowledge infrastructure;
    4. Develop documents, training modules and other resources to assist National Geospatial Information Agencies in their transformation and modernization aspirations in alignment with the national to global vision of the Integrated Geospatial Information Framework;
    5. Facilitate a collaborative knowledge exchange and engagement atmosphere between the commercial geospatial industry, national geospatial agencies, and the broader user industries and civil society, towards developing public-private partnership models for co-creating geospatial knowledge infrastructure and strengthening of industry and institutional capacities; and
    6. Advocate, communicate and promote the value and utility of geospatial information and enabling technologies for sustainable development.

  • Esri tech to help power UN’s new global data hub

    Esri and the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) are working with a number of member states to utilize a data hub that will allow countries to measure, monitor and report on sustainable development goals (SDGs) in a geographic context.

    This new hub, called the Federated System for the SDGs, is based on Esri’s ArcGIS platform and will use location intelligence to make it easier for countries to collect, analyze, and share the data required to monitor progress toward the SDGs.

    The SDGs are a set of global goals that include such objectives as poverty eradication, access to safe water, clean oceans, eliminating hunger, gender equality, climate action, peace and justice, education and other important areas on the U.N. agenda.

    The Federated System explores new pathways for facilitating dataflows and action through data hubs. It then supports and informs data-driven decision-making by making the data open, usable, interoperable and visual.

    Based on the early success, UNSD and Esri are working to advance the initial research exercise to support broader adoption by other member states and organizations in 2018.

    “The Federated System for the SDGs leverages enabling technologies and capabilities to strengthen the ability of the national and global statistical systems to manage and share data and good practices for the SDGs,” said Gregg Scott, inter-regional advisor, UNSD Global Geospatial Information Management. “This has already provided the opportunity for National Statistical Offices to condition and structure data so that it can be portrayed in a geographic context and provide more insights and enable us to look at dependencies and interdependencies across SDG indicators.”

    First introduced as a research project, participation was by invitation only and consisted of six countries: Ireland, Mexico, the Philippines, Qatar, South Africa and Senegal. These countries helped define the requirements and deployment of a web mapping and data management platform that would eventually become the hub.

    The Federated System was announced in Mexico City, Mexico, by Esri founder and president Jack Dangermond.

    “The key challenge to collaboration between nations is a common digital context,” said Dangermond. “Data hubs provide this context with location intelligence and use organizations’ core data to engage stakeholders, communicate policy, inform the public, and measure progress.”

    Participants of the UN forum in Mexico City issued a declaration on the importance of geospatial technology’s role in implementing the SDGs. Using Esri’s capabilities to enable access, collaboration, analyticsand powerful maps provides visualization and awareness that supplies the critical information needed to ensure each country meets its commitment to these goals.

    Most importantly, the Federated System allows collaboration across countries and makes it possible to measure the success of global SDG initiatives for the first time.

    For more information on how Esri supports the UN and SDG requirements, visit go.esri.com/Sustain_Dev.