Pacific Community receives international recognition for geospatial innovation

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geospatialThe Pacific Community’s (SPC) Geoscience Division is being bestowed the Asia Geospatial Excellence Award for Disaster Management by Geosmart Asia, a leading conference and exhibition for the Asia-Pacific region showcasing the capabilities of geospatial technologies for national development and industry growth.

The award recognizes exemplary innovation and practices in geospatial information and technology in the Asia-Pacific region.

“The Pacific region is prone to the vagaries of nature and geospatial information has proven to play a significant role in preparedness and mitigating losses. In such a scenario, the vision and initiatives of SPC’s Geoscience Division to promote geospatial information for safeguarding the region are commendable,” Geosmart Asia Pacific Vice President, Prashant Joshi said, in announcing the accolade.

SPC’s Geoscience Division is at the forefront of satellite image data and technology services that benefit the Pacific region across a broad range of sectors including  climate change adaptation and disaster management, forestry, land use planning, agriculture, fisheries, infrastructure and urban planning, biodiversity conservation as well as education.

The division has a number of ongoing initiatives with several development partners on developing decision support tools that produce realistic natural hazard impact scenarios for use in planning, disaster preparedness and response activities, using hazard and exposure spatial data.

SPC, through its Geoscience Division, also jointly hosts the annual Pacific Geographic Information Systems and Remote Sensing (GIS/RS) Conference with Fiji’s Department of Lands the University of the South Pacific which brings together over 300 participants from over 30 countries, including Pacific Island government representatives, consulting companies and the private sector.

“SPC is delighted to receive this award and due credit goes to the dedicated team of professionals in our Geoscience Division,” Pacific Community Director-General, Dr. Colin Tukuitonga said.

“Through their expertise and work ethic SPC is able to provide valuable support to Pacific Island countries and territories with recent examples being the provision of satellite imagery assistance in the immediate aftermath of Tropical Cyclones Pam and Winston,” Dr Tukuitonga added.

The Asia Geospatial Excellence Award for Disaster Management will be presented to SPC at the annual GeoSmart Asia Conference which will be held in Malaysia in October.

Media contact:
Sachindra Singh, Senior Geospatial Systems Architect, [email protected] or +679 338 1377
Wolf Forstreuter, SPC GIS and Remote Sensing Specialist, [email protected]

Useful links:
GeoSmart Asia 2016
Pacific GIS/RS Conference

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Disaster
Disaster Management
Geospatial Support
Awards ceremony