Geo-Siberia 2007

The Geo-Siberia 2007 conference and exhibition was held in Novosibirsk, Russian Federation from 25th to 27th April 2007. Organised by the Siberian State Academy of Geodesy (SSGA) in Novosibirsk, it was attended by more than four hundred participants, including forty international visitors. The vice-mayor of Novosibirsk and other local and visiting academics, including John Trinder, first vice-president of the ISPRS, addressed participants. International companies, local-government and commercial organisations involved in the spatial-information industry attended an accompanying exhibition.

Opening Plenary
The opening plenary session included papers, mainly given in Russian, by SSGA staff, international visitors, local researchers and industry representatives. Professor Kaprik, SSGA rector, described the SSGA education programme comprising specialists in cartography geodesy, photogrammetry etc. working in five institutes and 27 departments, with related areas. The summer was, he said, used for field practice. The Aca–demy spent 100m Roubles per annum (25 Roubles˜1USD) on research and had excellent R&D facilities. Co-operation with various industry groups was very fruitful and created innovative technologies. SSGA and MIIGAik in Moscow were the two major education institutions in Russia for geodesy, photogrammetry etc.

Photogrammetry
Professor Yambaev (MIIGAiK) discussed crustal motion and engineering deformation studies using Glonass to predict earthquakes. Professor John Trinder (ISPRS, Australia) spoke on the definition of sustainability indicators and contributions that could be made to assessing sustainable development using remote-sensing technologies. James Cavanagh (UK) spoke of a crisis in surveying in the UK; there was a confused market resulting from public lack of awareness of the important work done by professional surveyors. Professor Schmitt (Germany) outlined earthquake-risk research in Rumania, where forty German researchers were carrying out GPS measurements for crustal-motion determination. Professor Konecny (Germany) addressed cadastre and photogrammetry. Cadastral systems were needed to manage ownership of land parcels and could double the value of land. Co-ordinated cadastres were better than monumentation. According to Professor Konecny, the costs of cadastres based on orthophotos could be reduced to US$5 per land parcel. He predicted that by 2014 a digital cadastre would show complete data and books would disappear; such a cadastre would be run by the private-sector and be cost-effective.

A round-table discussion session addres-sed the possibilities of greater co-operation in research and teaching between SSDA and other international organisations. Proceedings are available in seven volumes in hardcopy, and on CD; most papers are printed in Russian.