'The global financial crisis has been a disaster for many sectors of the economy, but it will have little effect on the spatial industry', says Shri Kapil Sibal, the Indian minister of science and technology.
According to Sibal, the spatial industry in India is too important to the development of new infrastructure and to national security and disaster management.
Government would continue to make funding available to develop the industry. He also foresaw tremendous opportunities for the development of export markets for spatial IT products, especially to Europe.
Sibal was making a plenary address to Map World Forum in Hyderabad on 10 February.
The minister said the development of a national spatial data infrastructure was a high priority. He was extremely enthusiastic about the ability of new-generation high-resolution 3D imagery based on airborne laser scanning to make a tremendous difference to planning activities.
However, speaking to the same audience, Shri M Hamid Ansari, the vice president of India, cautioned that technology could be used for good or ill. He noted that the perpetrators of the terrorist atrocity in Mumbai in November were armed with GPS and Google Maps as much as with bombs and rifles.
But that needs to be balanced, he said, by the democratisation and empowering effect of technology, which could provide information to ordinary people in ways that could change their lives.
According to Ansari, the only constructive option is better regulation of spatial technologies.
It is clear that for both men, the issue in India is to find a way to maximise the advantages of spatial technology while minimising the difficulties.
To this end, the Indian parliament will consider a number of new regulations this year. Sibal will introduce further development of the mapping policy, which regulates the Survey of India and the availability of map data to the general public.
Ansari wants to introduce a Regulatory Authority for spatial data that will have responsibility for the development of private industry and the development of consumer products based on spatial data, but which at the same time have regard for security issues.
He said the aim of the body would be to provide a level playing field to balance the completing demands of citizens and the government.
Source: http://www.asmmag.com/news/India-s-Changing-Map-Policy
