FIG Commission 7 Annual Meeting

15-20 May, 1995, Delft, The Netherlands


Detailed Report
List of Participants
Country Reports


Executive Report

The Chairperson of FIG Commission 7, Professor Ian Williamson (Australia) welcomed 60 delegates, correspondents and observers from 32 countries to the 1995 FIG Commission 7 annual meeting, held at the International Institute for Aerospace and Earth Studies (ITC), in Delft, The Netherlands. Professor Williamson was especially pleased to welcome participants from Africa and Latin America who were supported to attend the meeting by Commission 7 delegates from The Netherlands and Switzerland. It was also noted that a key feature of the 1995 meeting was to honour Professor Jo Henssen (The Netherlands) upon his retirement. Participants attended a 1-day seminar on "Modern Cadastres and Cadastral Innovations", held at the Faculty of Geodesy, Technical University of Delft, with the seminar being part of the workplan for the Commission 7 working party examining the cadastral vision for the year 2014. It was open to other interested persons and a total of 100 registrants attended the event. Delegates to the meeting also received reports of cadastral and land management activities for countries which were not represented at the 1994 annual meeting in Fredericton, Canada, and technical tours were conducted to the Water Board of Delftland, the Dutch Cadastral Office, two rural land development and land consolidation projects, and the "Delta Works" civil engineering project in Zeeland.

Business Arising from the Meeting

- The "Statement on the Cadastre" was presented to participants and it is intended that it be formally adopted at the PC Meeting in Berlin following the Commission 7 meeting.

- As established at the XX FIG Congress in Melbourne in 1994, the three Commission 7 working groups met several times during the annual meeting and their reports are attached. A sub-group of WG 7.1 consisting of Professor Don Grant (Australia) and Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand) was formed to work with Mr Jurg Kaufmann (Switzerland), to investigate the different international options for the privatisation of cadastral activities.

- Following a discussion of International Trends in Cadastral Data Pricing Policies, it was resolved that this topic be the subject of a half-day session consisting of country reports at the 1996 annual meeting of Commission 7, with Jurg Kaufmann (Switzerland), Don Grant (Australia) and Bill Robertson (New Zealand) delegated to develop guidelines on how the session is to be arranged.

- It was resolved unanimously that Professor Henssen be invited to become a corresponding member to Commission 7. It was also resolved that the Chairperson be given the right to remove the names of corresponding members who are no longer active in the Commission, with each case being treated on its merits.

- Participants were reminded that the FIG newsletter is now jointly sponsored by Commissions 3 and 7 and edited by Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand). The chairperson strongly supported the newsletter and noted that all contributions from delegates will be welcomed.

- Professor Williamson repeated the Commission's policy, as established at the 1994 annual meeting, that wherever possible support should be sought by delegates from developed countries to ensure attendance at Commission 7 annual meetings by participants from developing countries. This process has already commenced with attendance at this meeting by participants from Latin America and Namibia sponsored by the Dutch and Swiss governments respectively. For 1996, Dr Winfried Hawerk (Germany) has already indicated that support has been obtained for a participant from Nepal to attend the annual meeting.

Future Events

1995 62nd FIG PC Meeting, Berlin, 22-26 May 1996. Several Commission 7 delegates will present papers at a symposium on the contribution of land regulation and economics in moving from centrally planned to market economies.

A Workshop on Cadastre in Developing Countries, will be held in Gavle, Sweden, following the Berlin meeting and is being supported by Commission 7.

The 1995 Australasian Cadastral Conference will be held in Wellington, New Zealand, from 14-16 June 1996, and supported by Commission 7. For further contact: Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand).

Cambridge Conference for National Mapping Organisations to be held in Cambridge (UK) from 25 July to 1 August 1995. Commission 7 is supporting a special half-day session on cadastre and land management.

Several Commission 7 delegates will attend and present papers at an urban cadastral workshop at the XVII UN Cartographic Conference to be held in Brazil from 30 July to 4 August 1995.

Commission 7 will be represented by Dr Paul Munro-Faure at the FIG/CASLE Conference on Sustainable Development to be held in Harare, Zimbabwe, from 13-17 August 1995.

1996 Commission 7 Annual Meeting. Mr Andras Ossko (Hungary) presented details of the meeting which will be held from 16-20 June 1996 in Budapest following the GIS/LIS `96 Conference. The annual meeting also follows the HABITAT II conference in Istanbul the week before.

A proposal has been received by Professor John Badekas (Greece) for a Technical Tour of the Greek Cadastral System following the 1996 Commission 7 Annual Meeting in Hungary. Further details are to be obtained from Professor Badekas confirming and clarifying the arrangements.

A Symposium on Cadastre and Land Management is to be held in conjunction with the 1996 FIG PC Meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to be held from 15-19 April 1996, and fifteen abstracts of papers have been selected for presentation at the symposium.

1997 The Annual Meeting of Commission 7 is proposed to be held in Malaysia in the week before the FIG PC meeting in Singapore which will be held from 11-16 August 1997. The meeting will feature a symposium on cadastral systems in developing countries as part of the workplan for Working Group 7.2.

1998 XXI FIG Congress and Commission 7 Annual Meeting, Brighton (UK), 19-25 July 1998.


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FIG Commission 7 Annual Meeting

15-20 May, 1995, Delft, The Netherlands

Detailed Report

Monday 15 May 1995

Welcome

The Chairperson of FIG Commission 7, Professor Ian Williamson (Australia) welcomed 60 delegates, correspondents and observers from 32 countries to the 1995 FIG Commission 7 annual meeting, held at the International Institute for Aerospace and Earth Studies (ITC), in Delft, The Netherlands. Professor Williamson was especially pleased to welcome participants from Africa and Latin America who were supported to attend the meeting by Commission 7 delegates from The Netherlands and Switzerland (see List of Participants). The generosity of The Netherlands Cadastral Office and the Swiss Survey Society in sponsoring participants from these countries was warmly acknowledged. The Commission was also honoured by the attendance of the FIG President, Mr Earl James (Australia).

Professor Williamson explained the role, objectives and operation of the Commission and noted that a key feature of the 1995 meeting was to honour Professor Jo Henssen (The Netherlands) upon his retirement. The meeting was officially opened by Professor Dick Groot (Deputy Rector, ITC), who gave an excellent presentation on the importance of finding a balance between technology and community requirements when implementing cadastral systems and reforms. Finally, the organiser for the meeting, Mr Jan Sonnenberg (The Netherlands) welcomed participants.

Chairperson's Report

Professor Williamson reported on the highlights, major decisions and future events arising from the 1994 Commission 7 Annual meeting held in Fredericton, Canada. With regard to future events, Professor Badekas (Greece) noted that the Comite Europeen des Responsables de la Cartographie Officielle (CERCO) has a working party on cadastre and would be an appropriate organisation for Commission 7 to liaise with to coordinate the timing of conferences and seminars of common interest. The "Statement on the Cadastre" was presented to participants and it is intended that it be formally adopted at the PC Meeting in Berlin following the Commission 7 meeting. Professor Williamson thanked the people who contributed to this excellent document. Already, translations of the Statement have been made into English, French, German, Polish, Spanish, Russian, and Latvian, and it is proposed that a Chinese version also be produced. Copies of the statement in each language will be forwarded to the FIG Bureau for future distribution.

Working Groups

As established at the XX FIG Congress in Melbourne in 1994, there are three working groups operating within Commission 7: WG 7.1 Modern Cadastres (Jurg Kaufmann), WG 7.2 Cadastral Systems in Developing Countries (Tommy Osterberg) and WG 7.3 Land Management (Paul Munro-Faure). The working groups met several times during the annual meeting and their reports are attached. A sub-group of WG 7.1 consisting of Professor Don Grant (Australia) and Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand) was formed to work with Mr Jurg Kaufmann (Switzerland), to investigate the different international options for the privatisation of cadastral activities.

Technical and Accompanying Person Tours

Delegates attended a technical presentation at the Water Board of Delftland which has a history extending back to the 15th century. The business operations and functions which are especially important to life in The Netherlands were discussed, and participants toured the building that has served as headquarters of the Water Board for almost 400 years. During the day, accompanying persons toured the historic township of Delft which is over 700 years old, and visited a factory producing the world renowned Delft ceramic products. The day finished with a reception for participants hosted by the Mayor of Delft in the Town Hall.

Tuesday 16 May 1995

1-Day Seminar on Modern Cadastres and Cadastral Innovations

Participants in the annual meeting attended a 1-day seminar on "Modern Cadastres and Cadastral Innovations", held at the Faculty of Geodesy, Technical University of Delft. The seminar is part of the workplan for the Commission 7 working party examining the cadastral vision for the year 2014, and was open to other interested persons with a total of 100 registrants attending the event. The seminar was formally opened by Professor Theo Bogaerts (Faculty of Geodesy, TU Delft) with the introductory address given by Professor Williamson. The remainder of the program involved presentations from Professor Jo Henssen (basic principles of cadastres), Dr Winfried Hawerk (cadastral systems in Germany, Austria and Switzerland), Professor Don Grant and Mr Bill Robertson (cadastral progress in Australia and New Zealand), Mrs Agneta Ericsson (Swedish cadastral system), Mr Paul van der Molen (Napoleonic systems in France, Belgium and The Netherlands) and Mr Jurg Kaufmann (key points for the "Vision Cadastre 2014"). A highlight of the day was a series of on-line demonstrations to the cadastral systems of The Netherlands, Austria, Sweden and Finland.

Wednesday 17 May 1995

Delegates visited the Aalsmeer Flower Auction in the morning and observed the operation of an organisation involving over 1800 people involved in local and international flower sales and distribution. In the afternoon, a tour was conducted of the Utrecht office of the Dutch Cadastral Office. Participants received presentations on the organisation of the Cadastral Office, the Dutch cadastral system, and demonstrations of the automated registers, the land consolidation process, and the cadastral GIS. Accompanying persons toured a music museum in the afternoon and a dinner was hosted in the evening by the Dutch Cadastral Office.

Thursday 18 May 1995

In the morning, delegates received reports of cadastral and land management activities for countries which were not represented at the 1994 annual meeting in Fredericton, Canada. These reports detailing current reforms, problems and issues to be resolved, are attached in addition to update reports for several other countries represented at Fredericton. In the afternoon, participants travelled to Utrecht to study rural land development in The Netherlands and a local land consolidation project. To close the day's activities, a dinner was hosted by the Netherlands Association of Geodesy at which Professor Jo Henssen was honoured upon his retirement. Presentations were made by Mr Paul van der Molen, on behalf of the Association, and Professor Ian Williamson, on behalf of Commission 7, thanking Professor Henssen for his contribution over many years. In addition, the Commission now has a `song book' and its own Commission 7 song, thanks to Jurg Kaufmann (Switzerland).

Friday 19 May 1995

The final working session of the annual meeting commenced with a discussion of international trends in cadastral data pricing policies. It was noted that while low pricing policies are employed in some countries to promote economic development, in other countries this approach is causing problems since sufficient funds are not being obtained to ensure proper maintenance of the systems. Agencies in some countries are applying much higher prices since they have been instructed to recover their costs according to government policy, however this can have the effect of forcing user agencies to collect their own data which leads to duplication of datasets and associated inefficiencies.

Since the sale of descriptive data (for example, land registry information) in many cadastral systems raises greater funds that the spatial or cadastral survey data, one option discussed is to place a levy on the sale of descriptive data which helps fund maintenance of the map and coordinate base. The argument for this approach is that the integrity of descriptive data relies upon the associated spatial data and that therefore a component benefit is derived from each sale of descriptive data which should be attributed to the cadastral survey. Finally, it was resolved that this topic be the subject of a half-day session consisting of country reports at the 1996 annual meeting of Commission 7, with Jurg Kaufmann (Switzerland), Don Grant (Australia) and Bill Robertson (New Zealand) delegated to develop guidelines on how the session is to be arranged.

Corresponding Members

Firstly, it was resolved unanimously that Professor Henssen be invited to become a corresponding member to Commission 7. Professor Williamson then spoke of the fact that Commission 7 now has a long list of corresponding members, some of whom have not attended annual meetings or corresponded with the Commission for many years, which adds considerably to the cost of operating the Commission. Since corresponding members are invited to participate in the Commission at the discretion of the Chairperson and delegates, it was resolved that the Chairperson be given the right to remove the names of corresponding members who are no longer active in the Commission, with each case being treated on its merits. It should be noted that this procedure will not apply to delegates, who are nominated to the Commission by their member societies.

FIG Commissions 3 and 7 Newsletter

Professor Williamson reminded participants that the newsletter is now jointly sponsored by Commissions 3 and 7 and edited by Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand). The chairperson strongly supported the newsletter and noted that all contributions from delegates will be welcomed. These may be short reports and need not be long technical papers.

Support for Participation at Annual Meetings

Professor Williamson repeated the Commission's policy, as established at the 1994 annual meeting, that wherever possible support should be sought by delegates from developed countries to ensure attendance at Commission 7 annual meetings by participants from developing countries. This process has already commenced with attendance at this meeting by participants from Latin America and Namibia sponsored by the Dutch and Swiss governments respectively. For 1996, Dr Winfried Hawerk (Germany) has already indicated that support has been obtained for a participant from Nepal to attend the annual meeting.

Future Events

1995 62nd FIG PC Meeting, Berlin, 22-26 May 1996. Several Commission 7 delegates will present papers at a symposium on the contribution of land regulation and economics in moving from centrally planned to market economies.

A Workshop on Cadastre in Developing Countries, will be held in Gavle, Sweden, following the Berlin meeting and is being supported by Commission 7.

The 1995 Australasian Cadastral Conference will be held in Wellington, New Zealand, from 14-16 June 1996, and supported by Commission 7. For further contact: Mr Bill Robertson (New Zealand).

Cambridge Conference for National Mapping Organisations to be held in Cambridge (UK) from 25 July to 1 August 1995. Commission 7 is supporting a special half-day session on cadastre and land management.

Several Commission 7 delegates will attend and present papers at an urban cadastral workshop at the XVII UN Cartographic Conference to be held in Brazil from 30 July to 4 August 1995.

Commission 7 will be represented by Dr Paul Munro-Faure at the FIG/CASLE Conference on Sustainable Development to be held in Harare, Zimbabwe, from 13-17 August 1995.

1996 Commission 7 Annual Meeting. Mr Andras Ossko (Hungary) presented details of the meeting which will be held from 16-20 June 1996 in Budapest following the GIS/LIS `96 Conference. The annual meeting also follows the HABITAT II conference in Istanbul the week before.

The proposed program includes a 1-day seminar in connection with Working Group 7.3 on "The Transformation of Cadastre and Land Management Administration in Former Socialist Countries" and "Necessary Changes in the Legal Environment of Cadastre and Connected Problems in Countries of Eastern and Central Europe". Technical presentations will include tours of the Hungarian cadastral system and the Budapest Land Office. A one-day workshop will be held on the Tuesday to draw greater attendance from delegates participating in the GIS/LIS 96 conference held the previous week. Suggestions are sought from delegates for examples of appropriate land management software packages which might be demonstrated at the one-day seminar. Suggestions should be sent to Dr Paul Munro-Faure.

A proposal has been received by Professor John Badekas (Greece) for a Technical Tour of the Greek Cadastral System following the 1996 Commission 7 Annual Meeting in Hungary. Further details are to be obtained from Professor Badekas confirming and clarifying the arrangements.

A Symposium on Cadastre and Land Management is to be held in conjunction with the 1996 FIG PC Meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to be held from 15-19 April 1996, and fifteen abstracts of papers have been selected for presentation at the symposium (see attached draft Cadastral and Land Management Seminar program).

1997 The Annual Meeting of Commission 7 is proposed to be held in Malaysia in the week before the FIG PC meeting in Singapore which will be held from 11-16 August 1997. As the delegate from Malaysia was unable to attend the Delft meeting to present that country's proposal, Professor Williamson is to contact Malaysia to confirm meeting details. The meeting will feature a symposium on cadastral systems in developing countries as part of the workplan for Working Group 7.2.

1998 XXI FIG Congress and Commission 7 Annual Meeting, Brighton (UK), 19-25 July 1998.

Close of Meeting and Final technical Tour

At the close of the meeting, Professor Ian Williamson thanked participants for their attendance, and Mr Jan Sonnenberg (The Netherlands) and his colleagues from the Dutch Cadastral Office for their sponsorship and organisation of the meeting. Professor Williamson also thanked Dr Gary Hunter (Secretary, Commission 7) for his assistance. Delegates then attended the final technical tour of the meeting with a visit to the "Delta Works" civil engineering project in Zeeland which protects the land against the sea.

I.P. Williamson

Chairperson, FIG Commission 7


Back Dept. of Geomatics

FIG Commission 7 Annual Meeting

14-20 May, 1995, Delft, The Netherlands

List of Participants
Note: (*) Delegate, (-) Correspondent

Australia

Austria

Bolivia

Canada

Costa Rica

Czech Republic

Denmark

El Salvador

Finland

France

Germany

Greece

Guatemala

Hong Kong

Hungary

Indonesia

Korea

Latvia

Luxembourg

Netherlands

New Zealand

Norway

Poland

Slovakian Republic

Slovenia

Sweden

Switzerland

Turkey

United Kingdom

Yugoslavia

Apologies

Austria

Belgium

Japan


Back Dept. of Geomatics

1995 FIG Commission 7 Annual Meeting

Delft, The Netherlands

Country Reports

Australia (D. Grant) - Update Report

Austria (G. Schennach) Bolivia (E. Mendoza)

Costa Rica (J. Avendano Machado)

El Salvador (J. Silverio Enriquez)

Finland (M. Uimonen) - Update Report

Guatemala (R. Gonzalez Diaz-Duran)

Hong Kong (C. Tang)

Indonesia (D. Walijatun)

Korea (J-H Kim)

Latvia - Update Report

Main Problems:

Main Lessons:

Namibia (W. Werner)

Problems include:

New projects include:

Slovak Republic (M. Dzur-Gjedos)

Switzerland (J. Kauffman) - Update Report

United Kingdom (M. Griffiths) - Update Report

Yugoslavia (M. Gostovic)
Back Dept. of Geomatics
Maintainer : David Mercer - webmaster@fig7.org.uk
Last Modified: September 1996.