Keynote Address by Mr Lam Joon Khoi
Chief Executive, Singapore Land Authority
At the ESRI Asia Pacific User Conference,
Singapore International Convention & Exhibition Centre,
20 -21 Jan 2009

Greetings
Good morning ladies and gentlemen,

I would like to thank Leslie Wong for the opportunity to share my thoughts with a group of expert users and practitioners present at this conference. I commend Jack for his insightful presentation on GIS and I have gained much from it. I am mindful that I am speaking to a well-informed group and many of you are already familiar with the subject of GIS. In fact, some of you will be presenting at this conference over the next 2 days. I look forward to interacting with some of you. This morning I intend to share some of my thoughts on the use of geospatial information and to give you an update on the Singapore spatial data infrastructure development.

Geospatial Industry and Businesses is a Growth Area
Let me begin by congratulating those who are in the business of geospatial information and exploitation. You are in a growth industry. This conference is indeed welcome by many in Singapore and the region. Despite the economic gloom and challenges currently confronting the whole world, I believe the use of geospatial information will continue to grow, and grow rapidly.

Why do I think so? As countries put more people and things into cities, the urbanization of cities will increase the complexity in land usage. As cities become densely populated and well developed with modern infrastructures, we can expect more geospatial information to be available for capture. More help is then needed to manage and analyse the vast information. The content of information also changes over time and that too has to be managed. I can see the transformation happening in Singapore too. Singapore is adding more road and rail infrastructures. More lands are re-developed with higher intensification. We are using the subterranean space more intensely than more. Hence, information over different levels of space (e.g. from subterranean, to ground level and into the airspace) will be captured. In short, the supply of geospatial information will continue to grow in scope and quantity. Information will be in 2-dimensional and even 3-dimensional form. There is also the time dimension of geospatial information to manage. Beyond the cities, there are other geospatial information to manage – natural resources, the environmental issues (such as climate change, water issues) and so on.

I also believe the demand for geospatial information will correspondingly increase. People and organizations need to know when and where things happen. Increasing ownership of mobile devices, such as handphones and PDAs with GPS, adds to the demand for more location-based services. Once decision-makers understand and appreciate the value of graphical presentation of situation, analysis and simulation using GIS, there is no turning back. The common saying – A picture is worth a thousand words – needs no further elaboration. The increases in supply of and demand for geospatial information provide a positive outlook for the industry.

While many countries recognized that geospatial information and its exploitation is a rapidly growing and profitable industry, each has its own challenges. Let me share with you a little about the Singapore Geospatial Story.

The Singapore Geospatial Story
In Nov 2007, at a similar ESRI user conference in Singapore, I spoke about the importance of geospatial information for decision-making. I shared that the use of geospatial information in the Singapore Public Service has been around for many years, primarily in the security and land planning authorities. Our Land Data Hub, for instance, was in place since 1989. Today, 15 public agencies are sharing some 125 layers of geospatial information through our network, known as LandNet. If you wish to know more about LandNet, my colleague will be speaking on it tomorrow morning. Since April 2008, the Singapore Public Service has embarked on a new phase. We have decided to link up the Land Data Hub and 3 other data hubs under a national spatial data infrastructure (NSDI) framework. The other data hubs are repositories of data concerning people, businesses and security matters owned by various public agencies. Hitherto, all the 4 data hubs have been developed and operated independently. In our concept of NSDI, Singapore aims to develop an environment in which public agencies can collaborate and share data more easily.

We named our NSDI initiative as the Singapore Geospatial Collaborative Environment, or SG SPACE in short. The implementation of SG SPACE will allow geospatial information from many public sector sources to be shared within a consistent reference framework across the public sector. It is our vision for this initiative to go beyond the public sector to encompass the private and people sector, through licensing and the provision of common goods. The initiative will result in removing duplication of data collection, encouraging re-use of data, and making informed decisions and monitoring. A multi-agency and inclusive committee has been formed to drive and coordinate the various action plans. We hope the b leadership and governance in the committee is sufficient to drive the changes and implementation.

We will be inviting the industry in a few months’ time to help us build a national clearing house for geospatial data. In essence, the clearing house will link up all the 4 hubs that I spoke about earlier. It will provide a gateway for easy discovery and rapid access to geospatial information across the public sector.

One of the goals of SG SPACE is to strengthen our policy formulation and evaluation. We know geospatial information is essential to support our approach to emergencies, environmental challenges (e.g. climate change and water issues), disease management and control, and so on. But we are not just looking inwards. We believe SG SPACE can potentially provide the private and people sector with useful information that helps them to deliver their products and services better. Hence, we are also building an intelligence map system that is interactive to serve the public better. Besides presenting the public sector information, the intelligence map system can potentially allow individuals and businesses to use some of the public geospatial information via mash-up. All in all, everyone stands to gain in SG SPACE.

Challenges
Most of you would know that there are many challenges facing those developing an NSDI. I shall highlight 2 of them which I believe are not unique to Singapore.

One challenge is how to get our hands on good authoritative data? Authoritative data are those that are closest to the source, authentic and accurate for the functions that they are intended for. Unless we collect all the data ourselves, which is impractical and duplicative, we have to rely on others. However, often the data source owner needs to be thoroughly convinced on our needs before it can agree to provide or share the information. That to me is a reasonable precaution on the part of the data owner. However, sometimes the issue of privacy and security of data could be used conveniently as a reason for not sharing the data. Some of the impediments to sharing are even stipulated by the legislations. Recently, the terrorists who wrecked havoc in Mumbai were reported to have used Google Earth for “location intelligence” and operational planning. This event will undoubtedly reinforce the list of considerations in any future releases of geospatial information. I believe there is no short cut to overcome the impediments to sharing and we must persevere to create a mindset of sharing, and responsible usage. A transparent and collaborative environment is perhaps a good approach to begin.

Another challenge is how to convince decision-makers to invest in geospatial applications and information. You and I are the converted ones and we know the benefits and limitations of using geospatial information. However, many decision-makers have not realized that geospatial information is essential to them and their businesses. Having been in the military service for 20 years, I appreciate the value of GIS for operations and analysis. Therefore, it did not take my staff long to convince me that geospatial information is essential to the public service too and the idea led to the birth of SG SPACE.

My advice to you is therefore to stay informed on good examples of geospatial applications. Start with pilot projects and be quick to scale up. I believe the benefits, both tangible and intangible, can far exceed the costs of implementation. For example, my colleagues have created a geospatial model for landslide risk assessment through sheer conviction that GIS can help them in their work. They did not let the lack of geospatial information discourage them. They will be presenting the model tomorrow.

Closing
In closing, I bly believe the use of geospatial information is a growth area that all of you are well placed to take advantage of. The Singapore Public Service’s drive towards a collaborative environment of sharing and re-using geospatial data is currently underway. Under the SG SPACE initiative, we can reap great benefits to the public sector, the private sector and the people sector. I have also highlighted some challenges that can be expected along the way, but they are not insurmountable. This conference is one reason why I am confident that those challenges can be overcome.

I wish everyone here a fruitful conference over the next two days.

Thank you very much for your attention.