News in 2025
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Brisbane, Australia is the perfect city for a conference. The conference centre BCEC is located in the city centre, hotels are in close proximity and in walking distance to BCEC, and the newly opened walking bridge between the north and south part of the city makes walking even easier. The bridge was used frequently by the participants, to and from hotels, and for the Welcome Reception held on the north side in the 7th floor open-air lawn between the Star Brisbane Resort’s four towers. Several technical walking tours were organised, the gala dinner was held in the newly renovated and beautiful main hall of the town hall, also in walking distance, and to make use of the water, too, a survey vessel was sailing up and down the river with Working Week participants.
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At the south side of the walking bridge, in recognition of the FIG Working Week and Locate25, a special survey mark was installed and revealed on Monday morning 7 April, right before the Opening Ceremony.
The permanent survey mark (PSM) has been installed by the Queensland Government, near the start of the South Bank end of the Neville Bonner Bridge that spans the Brisbane River. The PSM signifies the role played by surveying and spatial sciences in urban development, infrastructure projects and land management.
The PSM was officially unveiled by Steve Jacoby, Conference Convenor and Executive Director, Spatial Information | Georesources in the Queensland Department of Natural Resources and Mines, Manufacturing and Regional and Rural Development, together with FIG President Diane Dumashie. For FIG it is important to include legacy projects in our conferences and at each destination. This is one of the strengths by moving the FIG Working Week around the world each year to different countries and cities. Permanent Survey Marks are fundamental to the alignment of spatial data with physical infrastructure, enabling accurate mapping, land surveys and large-scale construction projects.
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Other legacy projects during the Working Week included special drone sessions with school teachers and a special focus on the SDGs in the technical programme, hereunder one session each day with specific focus on Private Sector Contributions to the SDGs, the crucial role of governments to achieve SDGs and the nexus between SDGs and Professional Education in the Geospatial World, as well as special displays of FIG and GCA on the enormous screens of the Cube, the technical university area.
The two FIG Task Forces on Diversity and Inclusion and FIG and the SDGs, in collaboration with She Maps, organised a touching legacy project which will stand as a lasting testament to this event. They had developed a visual piece that connects past, present and future: comparative images of Brisbane in 1975 and 2025, which was accompanied by a commemorative plaque. This legacy is not just a frame with images, but a visual story that reminds us how much a city can change, and how essential geospatial technologies are to understand that change. Beyond that, it leaves behind something tangible for the next generation. There is a need for teachers who inspire, we need images that tell stories, and we need young people to see themselves as part of the change.
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Around 1,400 national and international participants from 85 countries found their way to Brisbane, located in Queensland, Australia. Queensland Government was a central partner for the conference, with Executive Director Steve Jacoby, Queensland Government, as Conference Convenor. The conference thanks him and his staff for their amazing involvement and input, both to the technical programme, they organised all technical tours, and arranged with a survey vessel that was available during all three conference days, and which had many curious participants on board. FIG commission 4 delegates (Hydrography surveying) had a particular interest in the vessel – however missed their appointment as they could not find their way to the landing stage. An extra tour was organised for them.
The local organisers in Brisbane, with Peter James in the lead, had secured special spots for the welcome reception, gala dinner, as well as invaluable contact to the universities in Brisbane and further input to the technical and social programme.
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A good number of national and international sponsors and exhibitors filled out the bust hallways of the Plaza floor at BCEC. Many with creative and impressive stands, and with the exhibitors located in the hallways there was a constant flow of participants around the stands. Many constructive conversations were held, and the exhibitors seemed to be busy at most times.
Both large and smaller stands were to be found, even small 1x2
display pods which seemed to be quite popular.
A very large thanks to all sponsors and exhibitors – without you the
conference would not have been possible.
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The local organisers had ensured a powerful opening with Songwoman Aunty Maroochy, an Elder and the Songwoman and Law-woman of the Turrbal People, the original inhabitants of Brisbane, and the Dippil people of the Sunshine Coast area. She is a direct descendant of Daki Yakka – Chief of the Old Brisbane tribe. She told and sang the story of her ancestors from the region.
Hereafter the honourable Anderew Powell MP Minister for the
Environment and Tourism, and Minister for Science and Innovation took
over the stage welcoming the conference to Brisbane, highlighting the
importance of the work of surveyors and geospatial experts. Conference
Convenor Steve Jacoby, competently guided all 1,400 participants through
the opening ceremony as Master of Ceremony. Kate Lundy, Chair of the
Board of GCA welcomed all to Brisbane and Australia, with an exciting
merge of the national event Locate25 with FIG Working Week 2025, hoping
that both national and international participants will learn from each
other and share good time together. Peter James, chair of the LOC, held
an address on behalf of his father, Earl James, who is Honorary
President of FIG (read more about Earl James experiences in FIG in FIG
publication 75). A both fun and amazing conference theme song was
written and performed by Martin Brabec, Australia (QR code).
FIG President Diane Dumashie was final speaker at the Opening Ceremony,
which was concluded with the FIG Fanfare which marked the conference to
be opened. After the opening ceremony the dignitaries declared the
exhibition open and walked through the exhibition talking with the
various exhibitors.
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Two-hour plenary sessions were organised, packed with presentations and discussions. At each of the plenary sessions four high-level presenters gave their input under the overall theme of Collaboration, Innovation and Resilience: Championing a Digital Generation. After a round of Q&A to the four presenters as a new feature, an “ignite presentation” which is a short and lively presentation was a memorable final of each of the sessions.
These ignite presentations consisted of state-of-the-art examples and best practice projects. On Monday 7 April Geoscience Australia, represented by Lisa Bush, head of the national location information branch talked about how she had worked on building Australia’s first national geospatial information ecosystem with the Digital Atlas of Australia. The Tuesday ignite presentation was held by CEO Geoff Smith, Australian Spatial Analytics on Unlocking enormous potential: The neurodiverse geospatial workforce revolution – ASA is a non-for profit social enterprise revolutionising the geospatial sector by empowering neurodivergent talent. The last ignite speaker was Kass Boladeras representing Winyama, ensuring indigenous communities to have access to the digital tools and opportunities they need to thrive; talking about the power of indigenous mapping, through which project First Nations people are harnessing cutting-edge geospatial technology to map their land, tell their stories, and reclaim data sovereignty.
The first day at the plenary sessions Geography Championing a Digital generation; creating value and collaboration in a geospatial ecosystem was overall theme, with Mr Greg Scott, former UN-GGIM and now PVBLIC Foundation, World Bank approach to Land Rights and Climate Goals by Mr Stamatis Kotouzas, Innovating Global Geospatial Knowledge to Bridge the Digital Divide by Dr Li Penge, head of the new United Nations Global Geospatial Knowledge and Innovation Centre (UN-GGKIC) in China and the ESRI approach to GIS and the Geospatial Ecosystem by Director of Land Records/Cadastre Solutions Linda Foster.
The Tuesday plenary session had people in the centre in regard to land relationships in a climate action context. First speaker was Dr Chariss Griffith-Charles, Trinidad & Tobago on Resilience in human-land relationships in the face of powerful resource, climate, and social change which was followed up by four special sessions on the Small Island Challenges (SIDS). Kenneth Norre, CEO of LE34 approached the people aspect through the challenges in the Land and Geospatial workforce. Viliami Folau, Tonga linked Land Climate and people in his presentation, with further discussions in the SIDS sessions, and finally Brett Leavy elaborated over how Virtual Songlines Digital Twin (VSDT) details and documents the continuing First Nations perspectives and presence within Australia’s major cities and regional towns.
On Wednesday, Allison Craddock Member of the Geodynamics and Space Geodesy Group at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, addressed the overall topic of the sessions, Building foundational competencies that support and benefit people; in land, marine and built environments with a perspective from space on how to create a common language that translates into meaningful knowledge using geodetic data and information. Profession Matt King, Directo of the Australian Centre for Excellence in Antarctic Science, Tasmania talked about Ice Sheets and Future Shorelines stating that every centimetre of extra sea-level brings approximately 1 million additional people globally into the zone impacted by the sea and how satellite geodetic data are increasingly able to define ice sheet changes and how these data, now of sufficient duration and robustness, can quite reliably be used for projections over the coming decades. CEO of Geoscience Australia Melissa Harris followed up on the “connected world” and how Geoscience Australia is transforming raw data into actionable insights. Finally Professor Anthony Yeh, the University of Hong Kong, gave a highly interesting presentation on big data and smart cities.
The three plenary sessions were chaired by FIG Vice Presidents Winnie Shiu, Qin Yan and Michalis Kalogiannakis.
The technical programme was packed with technical session, high-level and special sessions, sessions with partners such as UN-Habitat/GLTN, World Bank and national organisations, various forums, meetings, workshops and other elements with a broad variety of topics spanning over the whole spectre of the profession. The sessions were organised by the Chairs of FIG Commissions, Task Forces, Networks and Permanent Institutions together with the local organisers and the Queensland Government.
A special SIDS (Small Island Development) consisting of four sessions and two meetings were organised by FIG regional networks in cooperation with several organisations. Three dedicated history sessions were organised by the new Director of the Permanent FIG Institution of History, John Brock, who, like in previous years, was so kind to support the participation of Young Surveyors to the conference. We hope that his example will be used by others, helping young surveyors to attend the Working Week.
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The Young Surveyors Meeting should have been held at the Cube, an inspiring location belonging to the university. In last minute the venue was changed to another university location close by with a wonderful view over the city. A packed programme organised by the FIG Young Surveyors together with the Australian GCA Young and Emerging Professionals. Under the theme "Next-Gen Geospatial Professionals: Driving a Digitally Enabled Future", explored the power of emerging technologies, innovative practices, and global collaboration to shape a future that is digitally dynamic and sustainable. An impressive programme was organised by chair of FIG Young Surveyors Shirley Chapunza Tendai together with her creative and inspiring team. FIG Vice President Michalis Kalogiannakis attended the opening, and gave his opening remarks as FIG Council responsible for the Young Surveyors Nework.
https://fig.net/fig2025/youngsurveyors.htm
Thanks to the YS Sponsors:
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The Welcome Reception was held on Sunday evening on the north shore in a garden area at 7th level between buildings and featured a cultural element as well as a number of Australian animals such as a couple of Koalas, a snake and a baby-crocodile which could be held by brave participants.
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The Locate Dinner took place on Monday with a good number of especially national participants. International attendees could attend, too, to get a feel of the national event, and especially the many awards that were presented during the evening.
On Tuesday evening the ten FIG commissions invited interested to come to a dinner location to network and meet fellow attendees. Again, Brisbane was a perfect location with many restaurants at the South Bank that could cater for the participants. Commission 5 had 5 previous Commission chairs/vice chairs attending at the same time – Matt Higgins, Australia (2007-2010), Rudolf Staiger, Germany (2011-2014), Mikael Lilje, Sweden (2015-2018), Volker Schwieger, Germany (2019-2022) and Rob Sarib who has served as vice chair for most of the above mentioned chairs.
The newly restored Townhall was the location for the Gala Dinner on Wednesday night. The room was impressive, and 530 participants witnessed a festive and fun evening. FIG President Diane Dumashie welcomed all, and hereafter Markus Koper, Trimble, being a faithful sponsor to FIG Foundation said a few words, too on behalf of Trimble. The Gala Dinner included the FIG Foundation, too, and a welcome from their side presented the FIG Foundation grant recipients. The Japanese Company (and Bronze sponsor) Ripro, funded a young surveyor from Ukraine to attend.
The dinner was amazing in the beautiful townhall room and included the conference song, also performed in the Opening Ceremony, written and performed by Martin Belbic, entertainment by singing waiters during the dinner, and after the dinner a wonderful band that made all participants get up and dance merrily.
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Several well attended technical tours were offered which included a trip visiting Queensland Government Surveying, Spatial and Land Administration, Technical walking tour showing the preparations for Brisbane 2032 Olympics, a visit to the Geospatial Innovation and Neurodiverse Workforce, and the Queensland Government Norfolk Hydrographic Survey Vessel that cruised up and down Brisbane River. The Lands Surveying and Mapping Museum was open during the conference days for interested participants. Further, FIG Commission 3 had organised two very popular consecutive sessions on Mobile Technologies for Inclusive Sidewalk Mapping which included a walking tour in Brisbane.
In regard to the tours Brisbane again showed what a perfect conference city it is as most tours were in walking distance, and no shuttles or other transportation was needed.
A full day post-tour to the North Stradbroke Island on Friday 11 April attracted around 70 attendees, organised by Queensland Government with Convenor Steve Jacoby in the lead. A bus and ferry transported all to the Island where a visit to the local museum was organised which gave the background for the function of the island. The island was during the colony time used as quarantine before they were let into the mainland and Brisbane. The museum gave a good overview of the indigenous population and how they had lived before the colonisation. Hereafter the trip took the participants to various sights which included a highly interesting presentation by a representative of the indigenous people. He was a lively and amazing story teller, informing about the habits, life, and beliefs of the indigenous people in a very insightful way. Thanks to Steve Jacoby and his team for organising this very special tour.
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As part of the Working Week the FIG General Assembly was held. Please
see separate General Assembly Report
In the Closing Ceremony, FIG President Diane Dumashie summed up the
activities during this productive and inspiring week. She thanked the
local organisers, with Stephen Jacoby in the lead and Peter James as
chair of the Local Organising Committee for their tireless work for the
preparations, as well as the GCA team with especially Tony Wheeler, Bec
Pascoe and Cate Bonthuys, for their dedicated work.
At the end of the Closing Ceremony Tony Wheeler handed over the FIG flag to Peter Newmarch representing the local organsing committee for FIG Congress 2026 in Cape Town South Africa who invited all to South Africa 24-29 May 2026. The Closing Ceremony was followed by a farewell reception – which was at the same time a welcome to Cape Town.
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More information:
Louise Friis-Hansen
June 2025
