Geographic Information Systems, Regional Policy, and Future European Research and Development

U. Boes
European Commission
DGIII F4
200, Rue de la Loi
B-1049 Brussels
Belgium

Abstract

This paper sketches the way towards a European Information Infrastructure and the information Society, emphasising the role of Geographic Information and spatial data infrastructures. The role of the European Union's actions is explained, and the contribution of individual projects is outlined. Convergence and Interoperability are shown to be important elements for future research programmes.

Introduction

A few decades ago, people used nearly exclusively information put on paper. Computers existed already, but their use was tedious. Mainframes, even minicomputers, which were introduced into the market about thirty years ago, had to be operated via punched cards. Results were printed on long listings, difficult to handle and to interpret. Hardly anybody imagined that computers could be used for complex information. Diagrams, drawings, maps and cadastral plans could only be developed and updated on paper.

A master plan of a region or province, as a project for the use and reuse of an urban area, was developed as a paper dossier, and had to be corrected and redrawn in individual and separate stages, before agreement on this master plan could be reached. The design of an aircraft was done on paper drawings, and with full-scale mock-ups. Work functions were separated; when a department finished its part of the project, plans were passed over to the next department like over a fence.

Since then, technology has drastically evolved, nearly in a breathtaking speed. Computing power has highly increased, and has become affordable to everybody, even to children. The massive deployment of the Internet and the World-Wide-Web has accelerated this pace, and people characterise the speed of technical development in speaking of Webyears, a fraction of calendar years. Low prices, miniaturisation, high performance, the evolution of computer memory and of I/O devices have enabled the storing, handling and exchange of complex information, like maps and drawings. The World-Wide-Web allows to access such information over continents, modify it and make it again available to other users worldwide.

Evolution of technology is now impacting on methods of work, on industry, and on employment. Information stored in computers, accessible by everybody renders possible to turn down walls between departments in an organisation. So began the development of the new Boeing 777 in 1990 with a hand-written memo, which should remain the only paper used during its development. Simulations replaced mock-ups, customers and their preferences could be included right from the beginning of the design. Workflow systems allowed concurrent development with all stages participating, having all information available all the time. Suppliers became part of the design, and employees could openly discuss all problems. Assembly became more accurate, late changes were possible and cheap, maintenance manuals were developed at early stages. The resulting aircraft was delivered on time, it consumed less fuel, and could carry more passengers. Development costs could be decreased.

Computer supported co-operative work helps to bring together all parties involved in a project, at all stages. The architect, the urban planner, the civil servant in a municipality, environment organisations and citizens can consult the plans stored in the municipality's database from the start of the development of a master plan, observe the progress of the implementation of plans to build modern cities, and express their opinion. Expert knowledge can be efficiently used at the right time and place, and the advice of all communes of a region, of a province is readily incorporated. Besides direct cost savings, there are many intangible benefits to the general public. Bureaucratic procedures eventually become transparent.

Technology developed in Community funded projects is enabling the change of those procedures. The software from the project Geoworks [1] enables the concurrent handling of information from many different sources. Users can integrate data from remote databases into their own documents or applications. A query language allows users to build queries up to significant levels of underlying complexity, while remaining intuitive and user-friendly, and easy to handle. This software is used in the province of Bologna, for the development and assessment of provincial and municipal master plans. It is now being deployed all over Italy.

New companies are being formed, to intermediate with information, to deliver content and sort it out according to users' requirements. The use of Information Technology and Telecommunication leads to a different type of market and customer, who is mobile and can be anywhere on the globe. Products can be manufactured and delivered customised to individual customer's needs and wishes. This leads to emphasising quality, not only quantity, to a shorter life cycle of products, finally to virtual organisations encompassing not only the organisation itself but also suppliers, clients and users on a global scale. New types of jobs are created according the new and evolving business models.

The Information Society

The examples above do not demonstrate a future scenario, but a reality, which has been implemented already. However, a lot of effort has still to be spent until the full deployment of new technology, and the realisation of such new methods of work. Several obstacles have to be overcome until the full establishment of the global economy and the Information Society. The Information Society is not a challenge for the future, but one for the present. The European Commission believes that Europe must focus on an effective implementation of all aspects of the Information Society, and exploit the many opportunities offered by Information and Communication Technologies.

The European Commission plays a catalyst role in the transition to the Information Society. In 1993, the White Paper on 'Growth, Competitiveness and Employment' [2] was published. It describes the ways forward into the 21st century, in order to lay the foundations for sustainable development of the European economies. This White Paper has raised a series of reflections, considerations and activities, including an action plan for a comprehensive strategy and a set of measures aimed at taking the European Union into the information society [3], which was adopted in July 1994.

The action plan addresses the liberalisation of the telecommunications sector, to trigger the development of new services and promoting their widespread uptake. The social and societal dimension of the information society is to be taken into consideration, and regional information society initiatives are included in order to enhance cohesion. The action plan further recognises the pivotal role of education and training, and proposes support for the development of a strong European multimedia content industry, which is expected to create 1 million new jobs over the next 10 years. It includes the RTD Framework Programmes, and major international events, as well as regional activities, aiming to develop global rules underpinning the swift development of the global information society.

With these actions the Commission has established the building blocks of the information society in Europe and has significantly contributed to raising awareness of both the public and decision-makers.

Innovation

Community action aims to speed up the adjustment of industry to structural changes and to promote competitiveness by creating a favourable environment for industry, while it is up to the businesses to exploit the opportunities opened up. Activities undertaken aim at the promotion of intangible investment, the development of industrial co-operation, the strengthening of competition, and the modernisation of the industrial role of public administrations. Innovation is key, and it is defined as the commercialisation of an idea or invention in a new or improved product, process, or service, with the ultimate goal to maintain growth, competitiveness and jobs. The Green Paper on Innovation [4] proposed several measures and activities to foster innovation and to turn it into commercial success, one of which is to better direct research efforts towards innovation.

In this regard, Europe seems less well placed than its main rivals. The paradox is that it has an excellent scientific base but it is less successful than others in converting its competence into new products, services and market shares; this is especially true in high-technology sectors. This appears to be a culturally motivated, but important obstacle to implementing innovation; Europeans seems to be much more risk averse than Americans. Fragmentation of the market has also impeded the fruition of innovation, which is counteracted upon by the unification process of Europe, and the European Monetary Union (EMU). The Central and Eastern European countries, the newly independent states, as well as the Mediterranean countries are in the scope of Community action, although most of these countries are not yet economically mature to become fully associated to the European Union.

Standardisation and Consensus Building

Fragmentation, both economically and scientifically, corresponds to erecting borders and is a major impediment to innovation. The apparent ease of accessing and exchanging graphical information is often hampered by lack of compatibility. Simultaneous software specifications and developments by researchers and users have led to a variety of different formats for storage and transmission, resulting often in the impossibility to exchange information. There is a danger that these differences will result in technical incompatibility, locking customers into specific systems that may not meet their needs. Interoperability of networks, products and applications, allowing users to work with any type of system or information service, is an ever more crucial issue. Traditionally, it would be achieved by consensus building via a formal standardisation process. This has turned out to be not efficient enough in view of the particular features of the IT market, which are short product-cycles, a high degree of global integration and a limited emphasis on security. Rather, consensus building tends to be driven by market forces today.

Industry has created membership organisations, to define de facto standards, achieve consensus and define open systems. Open systems are to enable general 'plug-and-play', i.e. general compatibility of systems and components. In the early days, OSF and UI were formed, followed by OMG. OMG is promoting and standardising object-orientation and has had a considerable success with the definition of its CORBA architecture. UI did not survive, and OSF has now been integrated into the Open Group, along with X/Open, the mission of which has always been requirements and interface specification, and branding. The Open Group's mission is to promote a more responsive open systems process, facilitating faster time-to-market, reducing complexity, greater interoperability and portability and, as a result, enhance customer value. The Open Group is specifying IT-Dial-Tone, a general, easy to use information infrastructure for the Information Society.

Users, in particular, associate themselves in such organisations, turning the open systems movement towards their needs. In practise, however, the market is dominated by a few big players, who consider openness as equivalent to compatibility to some widely used products, which is far from the ideal situation. Apart from general compatibility, users are interested in transparency, performance, dependability, scalability, ease of use, and - last not least - the cost of systems in terms of investment and maintenance.

Many other industry standard organisations have been founded. To name only a few, POSC is active in the geo-physical area, or Groupe Riche in the health care area. The Internet Society watches about the further development of the Internet, with the technical work delegated to the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force). The World-Wide-Web Consortium [5] was founded at MIT and CERN, with seed funding from DARPA and the European Commission. It is designed to be a neutral, open forum for the evolution of Web technology. The consortium has today more than 200 members.

In the area of geographic information systems, the Open GIS consortium [6] aims at the full integration of geospatial data and geoprocessing resources into mainstream computing and the widespread use of interoperable, commercial geoprocessing software throughout the global information infrastructure by consensus building. OGC originates from the US, but recognises interoperability as a worldwide problem. European participation is rather low, and there is a risk that the de facto standards as defined by OGC will give a competitive advantage to US industry, if Europe is not involved in their definition. The European Commission is therefore supporting an activity, called GIPSIE, which aims to create awareness about GIS interoperability within European industry.

The European Commission feels that consensus between the different players is important in the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) sector, and has encouraged such industrially oriented initiatives. If we want the consensus approach to be a success, we must ensure that users' needs are properly represented, and that an appropriate platform for European companies will be provided to address the issues. Despite the emergence of the Single Market, region-specific aspects, of which language is the most conspicuous, must be respected if Europe is not to be left at a constant disadvantage.

Nevertheless, the formal consensus process offers still advantages. European standards bodies, such as CEN (European Committee for Standardisation) CENELEC (European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardisation) and ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) have solid experience in the formulation of specifications. They have a significant role in establishing connections, both between European and world bodies, and between users and manufacturers.

Geographic Information Systems and Global Spatial Data Infrastructure

In order to advance the consensus process for geographic information in Europe, GI2000 [7] has been defined to be a European policy. It will help to provide the basis for better and more efficient government, more effective management of scare resources, as well as fostering new business employment opportunities. GI2000 is a communication from the European Commission to the Council, which has, however, not yet approved this communication.

A major difficulty for the European GI market is lack of co-ordination. National administrations do not systematically co-operate with their equivalents elsewhere. Some steps have already been taken to move from purely national geographic information initiatives to a more European approach to mapping, statistics, utilities, environment and transport. In 1980 the European National Mapping Agencies created CERCO (Comité Européen des Responsables de la Cartographie Officielle), composed of the heads of mapping agencies from 32 countries to facilitate the exchange of practical experience. Furthermore, at Eurostat’s initiative, MEGRIN has developed a pan-European data set containing all the administrative boundaries of European communes in a harmonised format. GISIG, the Geographical Information Systems International Group [8], is a European-wide consortium of GI groups in universities and industry. GISIG is aiming at technology transfer, and is working on training and networking.

In 1994, with support from the EU IMPACT programme, the European Umbrella Organisation for Geographic Information (EUROGI) [9] was formed to bring together national and European organisations for geographic information that cover fields wider than those addressed by CERCO and MEGRIN. Today 17 countries and 3 European organisations are members and more are expected. The organisation has stimulated discussion on geographic information policies at the European level and has been instrumental in catalysing more active national geographic information policies in several countries. However, in spite of these various initiatives, the GI community in Europe remains highly national, and co-ordination efforts on a European scale are felt to have not yet been sufficient.

While European industry is disadvantaged by a lack of appropriate co-ordination at European level, other regions have already begun to develop the potential of Geographic Information. This is the case in Canada, Japan, and the US, where the government is actively encouraging the emergence of a dynamic GI industry. Vice President Al Gore recently proposed the establishment of a ‘digital earth’ database - a digital map of the world at 1 meter resolution - from which a range of new products and tools could be developed [10].

This initiative follows on from President Clinton’s Executive Order of 11 April 1994 setting up the National Spatial Data Infrastructure. One of the actions under this order is to require all future federal geographic information collection, storage and reporting to adhere to the standards of the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC), and co-ordination structures are being set up to this end. This initiative receives high level political support, and gives the US public and private sector an electronic market place for GI by offering and providing access to standardised data, which greatly facilitates consolidation and exploitation. The strength of the national market there gives US companies a springboard onto the global market.

Contacts for greater information sharing at global level have been initiated between the European Commission and several major trading partners, including the US, Canada, Australia and Japan. The conferences on Global Spatial Data Infrastructures (GSDI) in Bonn in September 1996 and North Carolina (USA) in October 1997 have started to lay the foundation for such international collaboration. The High Level Working Party proposed in GI2000 should act as a focal point for European input to these global discussions, providing a forum for debate and a means to achieve the consensus needed to strengthen Europe’s hand in these negotiations.

In Europe, several Community funded projects contribute to the establishment of the European spatial data infrastructure. The WELL-GIS Project, co-ordinated by GISIG, was funded under the European Union’s COPERNICUS programme to promote co-operation between research organisations throughout Europe, East and West, on all aspects of GIS. It has achieved transfer of technology and knowledge across Europe. The project GEIXS (Geological Electronic Information Exchange System) will achieve harmonisation of data formats in the geological domain, and implement a Web based information server for geological data. Issues for further European research and development, to drive the growing global market needs for spatial information and associated products and services, have been formulated as a result of experts' panel meetings, organised by the Commission's Joint Research Centre [11].

The second EU/CEEC forum on the information society, held in September 1996 in Prague [12], defined an action plan with thirty pilot actions, as European initiatives towards the Information Society in the Central and Eastern European countries. One of these pilot actions aims at Geographic Information Systems, and meanwhile, two projects have been launched and will contribute to the European Spatial Data Infrastructure. The PANEL-GI project proposes a GI European Network, to integrate the partners into a European framework. Panel-GI will inform the interested groups, in particular the private sector, in the central and eastern European Countries (CEEC) about the potential of Geographic Information Systems and help them develop this information technology in their countries.

The project ABDS (Administrative Boundary Data Services) has also originated from the above-mentioned forum on the Information Society. It aims to create inventories and harmonise administrative boundary data, which is assembled in the national databases of central and eastern European countries, and will constitute a network of services for access and delivery of data, extending the work of MEGRIN. Common rules for data capture, handling of data, ownership will be defined in a Memorandum of Understanding. It is essential that all countries cooperate in these projects, which will therefore serve as prominent cornerstones on the way to the Information Society.

The Internet

Geographic Information Systems are an important area for the transition to the Information Society, and have also high potential for commercial exploitation. The Information Society, serving its citizens, will have to apply Information Technology in many other areas, like health care, or education. The growth of the Internet, along with multimedia technologies, has attracted great attention, and brought new opportunities to businesses and citizens. The Internet is expanding with a hundred percent growth rate, and it has led to an explosive growth of the information accessible via the Internet and World-Wide-Web. Both RTD and regulatory issues will have to be addressed and will be aspects governing the future competitiveness of Europe. The acceptance of the Internet based Information Society will depend on a climate of confidence, created by clear rules and the wide adoption of good practice; the current Internet, however, still lacks the necessary user-friendliness.

Bandwidth is pivotal for the communication on the Internet, and in particular for transmission of multimedia information. As part of the European strategy for Trans European Networks, the European Commission is supporting the TEN-34 project [13], which will deploy high capacity facilities, up to 34 megabits per second, and even more in the future. It provides the first commercial grade service based on multi-vendor implementation of IP over ATM at 34 Mbit/s. Thus, the competitiveness of European research will be maintained, and the roll out of this project will address wider user requirements, and especially support multimedia applications. The near future will see an extension to 622 megabits per second, and even more. Other activities deal with IP Version6, to extend the functionality and the address space of the Internet, or prepare the development of Internet-2.

The Internet is enabling access to a plethora of information, and a key issue is to control access to this information, and to find what the user wants. This will enable applications in many areas like digital libraries, or cultural applications, and those in education. Internet is the infrastructure, which enables the wide-scale practice of electronic commerce. The growth figures show the potential of electronic commerce, and new services and applications are created. Problems remain with security and authentication on the net, and also the necessary payment infrastructure. Many trials are on their way, but confidence in the security of the Internet and related payment mechanisms is not yet established.

The Internet has developed as a self-regulated system, both in terms of its technical specifications and its rules on fair use. Regulation of several aspects has commenced, in particular on issues of security and encryption [14], protection of intellectual property [15], undesired or harmful information on the Internet [16,17]. Regulation has to be performed on a worldwide base, and the problem still seems enormous.

A number of projects supported by the European Commission research programmes address these issues, on all fronts. The World-Wide-Web Consortium, with the support by the European Commission, will promote the full realisation and leverage of the Web's potential. They provide a repository of information for developers and users, about their specifications and standards in demonstrations and roadshows of the new technology.

Convergence of Technologies

The Internet has raised many discussions on the use of new technologies, and their relation to more familiar technology. On consumer electronics, the merge between the home PC and the television set is discussed. Today, it is already possible, to surf on the World-Wide-Web using the TV, or to capture TV programmes on a PC; telephony over the Internet has become a rival to traditional telephones. Trials are carried out to connect household appliances to the Internet, and thus building the intelligent home and building. The future vision emerges that digitisation of all communication media, along with the Internet leads to the availability of services and all information desired, whatever the physical location, whatever the underlying technology, whatever the format. Information Technology, Telecommunications and contents merge, and create a ubiquitous Information Society, with mobile and personalised communications using multimedia services and information.

This will be particularly important for Geographic Information, which will be made available for all purposes and penetrate into all kinds of applications. Here, the challenge is still to make the technology and the possibility of the World-Wide-Web available to the needs of users of geographic information, which is in its infancy, despite current research efforts. Experiments to merge electronic commerce and the Internet with cartographic information have been conducted on an industrial scale and shown to be promising. Interoperability, especially interoperability to existing legacy applications, will remain a key issue, as it will be user confidence.

The Role of European Research Programmes

Community funding of IT R&D began in 1984, aiming at closing the gap between Europe's information technologies industries and those of US and Japan. With the inception of the Fourth Framework Programme in 1993 [18], the instruments have changed from solely R&D projects to an integrated set of R&D and take-up measures, including trial applications, demonstrators, best practice initiatives and first user actions. The research programme has become an environment for integrated technology development and take-up actions centred on IT users. Esprit is now a multi-sectoral cross-disciplinary, industrially oriented, RTD programme in an area underpinning the competitiveness of the whole European economic fabric; and a programme contributing to the creation of an advanced skill base and helping to pave the way for Europe's advent into the Information Society.

Considerable effort is made in ESPRIT to focus effectively on emerging industrial, societal and technological issues, which span the domains and tasks in its work-programme. This concentration is implemented through "joint calls" with other programmes, for instance on Multimedia educational software, or on research networking. Targeted actions such as special "Thematic calls" cut across several domains to better address key themes, such as electronic commerce or IT for mobility.

The fifth Framework Programme [19] will continue the fourth one, and at the same time implement radical changes to create a greater efficiency of the research programmes, following the need to address the European Union's major policy changes. This Framework Programme should consolidate research efforts, incorporate new topics, and change the way in which research is organised. Research is to be put at the service of people, by improving the bases of European competitiveness within a perspective of sustainable development.

The research themes identified in the framework programme decision are implemented by a number of "specific programmes", and these specific programme proposals were adopted by the Commission on 13 May 1998. In its proposals, the Commission has maintained its first budget proposal of ECU 16,300 million, which it believes necessary to achieve all the Programme's aims, particularly in the light of the additional research fields added by Parliament and Council at first reading.

The Commission's proposals set out detailed objectives for each of the following programmes:

The priority themes set out in the proposals will be addressed on the basis of around 20 Key Actions.

The Information Society Technology Programme - Creating a user-friendly Information Society - in particular will be a single and integrated programme of research, technological development, demonstration and technology take-up. The strategic objective of the Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme is to realise the benefits of the information society for Europe both by accelerating its emergence and by ensuring that the needs of individuals and enterprises are met.

The programme has four inter-related specific objectives, which focus the technology developments and enable the close articulation between research and policy needed for a coherent and inclusive information society. For the private individual the objective is to meet the needs and expectations of European citizens for high-quality, affordable general-interest services. Addressing the requirements and concerns of Europe’s enterprises, workers and consumers the objective is to enable both individuals and organisations to innovate and be more effective and efficient in their work and business, whilst at the same time improving the quality of the individual’s working life. Multimedia content is central to the information society; the objective here is to confirm Europe as a leading force in this field and enable it to realise the potential of its creativity and culture. For the essential technologies and infrastructures that form the building blocks of the information society the objective is to drive their development, enhance their applicability and accelerate their take up in Europe.

Organisations from countries outside the European Union will be able to participate in the RTD activities. Their participation will depend on special RTD agreements between the European Commission and their governments. Special support is foreseen for concertation activities in countries outside the EU, in collaboration with organisations in the Union.

Agenda2000 and Regional Activities

The Union's research programmes, with their international co-operation element, have prepared the integration of all the countries participating, towards the global Information Society. In this way, from the RTD point of view, the enlargement is anticipated, which is the theme of Agenda 2000 [20].

The communication of the European Commission, "Agenda 2000", was presented on 16 July 1997. It sets out the financial framework for the EU's activities in the period 2000 - 2006. Taking into account the importance of research for the future of the EU, Agenda2000 confirmed the need for a faster increase in the resources allocated to research than the forecast increase for GDP in the EU in the period in question.

Agenda2000 constitutes a broad outlook for the development of the European Union and its policies beyond the turn of the century, the impact of enlargement on the Union as a whole and the future financial framework beyond 2000, taking account of the prospect of an enlarged Union. Introducing "Agenda 2000", Commission President Jacques Santer stated: "The Union’s environment is changing fast, both internally and externally. It must set about adapting, developing and reforming itself. Enlargement represents a historic turning point for Europe, an opportunity which it must seize for the sake of its security, its economy, its culture and its status in the world."

Agenda2000 and the enlargement of the European Union, as well as the cohesion of the Union, are anticipated by a number of regional activities, too. In addition to the action programme on increasing awareness and promotion of the Information Society, pursued by the EC/CEEC Forum, several pilots actions have been launched within the context of the Structural Funds, and also funded by the national governments. Here, the public sector assumes the role of a catalyst, of an engine for change, and of a creator of demand for ICT based services. On of the prominent activities is the development of the telecommunications infrastructure, which is still weak in several countries. The number of both telephone exchanges, and Internet hosts have to be increased. This has been successfully done already in several countries of central and Eastern Europe; in other countries, such programmes are on its way. Regional and eventually global information systems result, in the service of the European citizen, and democracy.

In the European Union, and the Central and Eastern countries, a Europe-wide network of Innovation Relay Centres (IRCs) has been created encompassing 52 existing centres. These centres have been established under the INNOVATION Programme in the EU Member States, and under the INCO-Copernicus Programme of the Fourth Framework Programme, in Central and Eastern Europe. The ultimate goal of the IRC network is to improve the competitiveness of European industry through innovation.

In the Mediterranean countries, DGIII, Industry, is leading an initiative for the establishment of networks of Information Technology Centres, focussing on several technical domains. Such centres will support the creation and maintenance of local IT skills, while boosting regional awareness of the role of IT in industry and commerce.

Conclusion

Only a pan-European network and infrastructure will meet the requirements of the Information Society, and its demand for multimedia services and teleworking. This requires the elimination of borders of any kind, and of the still existing differences between the European countries.

Interoperability remains a global issue, which concerns not only technology and data, but also the user, and the society as a whole. Industry and European Union's actions strive to achieve such general interoperability, and to overcome fragmentation, by the creation of consensus. Convergence of technology will render possible to generate and exploit market opportunities that are centred on the user. Research and Technology development as funded by the Community will be a catalyst on the way to consensus, and to the general availability of information and services in a society, which eventually becomes a knowledge based society.

References

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