GIS to fi ght dengue epidemic in Bangkok
Authorities in Bangkok are resorting to a GIS to ease the dengue epidemic in the Thai capital. According to Bangkok governor, a longer rainy season and changing temperatures have favored the breeding of the mosquito that transmit the fatal disease. He added, the GIS will help the city officials to find critical epidemic areas. www.allheadlinenews.com

Chief Surveyor of Singapore is first Asian to receive coveted spatial science award
The Department of Geomatics, University of Melbourne will be presenting its annual Thornton Smith Medal for 2007 to its fi rst Asian recipient outside of Australia. Mr Soh Kheng Peng, who is chief surveyor of Singapore, Singapore Land Authority.
The Medal commemorates Jim Thornton Smith who founded the Department of Geomatics at the University of Melbourne in 1949 and was instrumental in the formulation and introduction of the Bachelor of Surveying degree in 1948. The Medal is awarded to a graduate from the Department of Geomatics who has shown a high level of distinction and leadership in the discipline.

Use of geographical data promoted in Japan by new law
Having recognized the great contribution of applications derived from data obtained through a combined use of GIS and positioning systems for a lot of valuable uses (cadastre, floods, spatial planning, statistics on old buildings, criminality rates etc.), the Japanese government decided to draft a law for the use of these data and to give guidance for orientation of future needs as well as for financial and human resources required. This will help avoid fragmentation of initiatives efficient use by different Japanese ministries. www.gmes.info

Jack Dangermond, ESRI President receives honor from ASPRS
ESRI president Jack Dangermond has been awarded the American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS) Outstanding Service Award for 2007. Dangermond is being recognized for his endowment of the ESRI Best Scienti? c Paper in GIS Award. Established in 1991, the award is given each year by the ASPRS Foundation to individuals who publish papers of scienti? c merit that advance the knowledge of GIS.

NRCan offers digital topographic data for free
As of April 1, 2007, Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) began offering its electronic topographic mapping data for free over the Internet. It is now permitting people to freely redistribute this data, helping to ensure that users receive accurate and consistent information. It will make its data collections available through GeoGratis (geogratis.gc.ca), which is a portal, provided by the Earth Sciences Sector of NRCan.

GIS ILWIS migrates to open source
The Integrated Land and Water Information System (ILWIS, http:// www.itc.nl/ilwis) is a PC-based GIS & Remote Sensing software, developed by ITC. The ITC directorate has recently decided to make current ILWIS software free of charge and to migrate it as such to open source software under the 52° North initiative. Leading research organizations in the ?eld of geoinformatics (ifgi, conterra, ITC, ESRI) participate in 52° North’s innovative development for establishing open spatial data infrastructures (SDI) and transformation of these into practical technological solutions.

Geospatial Intelligence Standards: Enabling a Common Vision
The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) has issued a new document that provides guidance and direction to develop an overall baseline for common geospatial standards used to share, manipulate, and exploit digital geospatial data. The document, “Geospatial Intelligence Standards: Enabling a Common Vision,” outlines the standards that will be used in the National System for Geospatial-Intelligence (NSG). The NSG is the combination of technology, policies, capabilities, doctrine, activities, people, data and communities necessary to produce geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) in an integrated multi-intelligence, multidomain environment. www.nga.mil

NATO awards GIS contract to TENET
NATO NC3 Agency has awarded the GIS Data Preparation Contract to TENET supported by Galdos Systems Inc. and IIC Technologies Inc in Canada. The project involves the generation of a wide range of geospatial data models compliant with some of the latest spatial open information standards from OGC and ISO and the conversion of many terabytes of vector, raster and gridded data. A large proportion of NATO’s paper holdings of maps and charts will also be digitized and converted to the same set of open standards. The objective is to create an open and shareable map database as part of NATO core GIS infrastructure withinz the Alliance. At the forefront of these open standards are the two key encodings of GML and GMLJP2 to provide effective encoding for Raster and Coverage data.
www.galdosinc.com

£2 million printing press for paper maps
Ordnance Survey Director General and Chief Executive Vanessa Lawrence officially pushed the on button of a massive new £2 million printing press at the mapping agency’s Southampton head office recently. The six-colour printing press is one of the largest in the country and will be used to produce Ordnance Survey’s paper maps, including the 650 different recreational and leisure maps that together cover every corner of Britain. www.OrdnanceSurvey.co.uk

India, ASEAN sign agreement to boost science and tech cooperation
India and ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) have signed a joint declaration for cooperation in Science & Technology. Mr. Kapil Sibal, Minister fo S&T and Earth Sciences and Dato’ Dr. Jamaluddin Mohd. Jarjis, Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation, Malaysia and Leader of ASEAN delegation said that the declaration will not only strengthen the Science & Technology ties between the countries in the region but will also make ways for new horizons.
India has offered ASEAN countries training in space technologies, including remote sensing applications and satellite design, as a part of measures to step up co-operation in the field. India, through the Indian Space Research Organisation, has offered ASEAN countries short-term training programmes in satellite design to help them fulfill their aspirations in the niche field. Besides, satellite design India has also offered access to remote sensing data, including satellite imagery of the region for weather forecasting.
The Heads of Science and Technology Agencies of the State/ Governments of Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, The Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam and India gathered and met in New Delhi, India on 6th November, 2006 for the 12th Technology Summit and Technology Platform, organized jointly by the Department of Science & Technology, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and ASEAN Committee on Science & Technology (COST).
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