'Austria-Central Asia Centre for GIScience' opened

This cooperative centre between Austrian universities and Central Asian partners in the Eurasia-Pacific Uninet was opened on May 15, 2008 in Bishkek at the Kyrgyz State University fpr Construction, Transportation and Architecture with addresses by Prof. Akymbek Abdykalykov - Rector of KSUCTA, Prof. Ishengul Boldjurova - Minister of Education and Science of KR, HE Ursula Fahringer - Ambassador of Austria to the Kyrgyz Republic and Prof. Brigitte Winklehner – President of Eurasia-Pacific Uninet.
Support from the Eurasia-Pacific Uninet and the ongoing cooperation with Z_GIS will facilitate joint projects, faculty and student exchanges, a number of on-site and mobility scholarships as well as the development of a research programme focussed on GIScience and application requirements in Central Asia.
The opening of the new centre was immediately followed by the Second Central Asia GIS Conference 'GIS for the Future of Central Asia' - GISCA'08, bringing a representatives from across Central Asia to a programme focussed on GIS education.

Bridge2Geo - R&D to Create a GI-Society

The GIS-Clusters of Salzburg (Austria) and Northrhine-Westfalia (Germany) have initiated BRIDGE2GEO in the EU FP7 Programme “REGIONS OF KNOWLEDGE” with a kickoff meeting on Feb 29/March 1. The two partner regions will intensify their collaboration in the GIS-sector and develop a plan of action targeting domains such as Renewable Energy, Security, Health, Trade and Tourism.

BRIDGE2GEO connects SMEs, research institutes and regional authorities from Salzburg and Northrhine-Westfalia. The overall objective is to strengthen the research potential of European regions, in particular by encouraging and supporting the development of regional “research-driven clusters”.

New strategies, communication & business models will be elaborated via the challenging “GIS 2.0 window” to promote implementation of GI-services. Special regard will be given to the European GMES initiative. BRIDGE2GEO will promote synergies between regional and research policies of the two regions. RTD strategies will be integrated into the economic development strategies as a basis for more focused use of the Structural Funds for R&D activities.

UN-SPIDER Expert Meeting: Feb 7-9. Salzburg

United Nations International UN-SPIDER Expert Meeting:
"Building Upon the Network of Regional Support Offices"
Organized by: The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and Z_GIS
Salzburg, 7 - 9 February 2008

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The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), through its new UN-SPIDER (“United Nations Platform for Space-based Information for Disaster Management and Emergency Response”) programme, and the Salzburg University Center for Geoinformatics with support from the Austrian government are organising the United Nations International UN-SPIDER Expert Meeting in Salzburg at Schloss Leopoldskron to establish an Operational Plan that will ensure that the Network of the Regional Support Offices (RSOs) contributes to the 2008-2009 activities. The Expert Meeting will bring together around 40 decision-makers and senior experts from around the world who will not only discuss how to efficiently coordinate and interact with the Network of Regional Support Offices, but also focus on Capacity Building, Knowledge Management and National Disaster Management Planning.

Vulnerability Assessment - Mozambique

Stefan Kienberger (Z_GIS) has successfully conducted a field trip to Mozambique within his PhD research to assess vulnerability to natural hazards (floods & droughts). Major objectives have been the identification of risk zones and additional geographic features with VHR-satellite images, identification of vulnerability factors (both through a participatory approach) and expert interviews. The results will be applied to model vulnerability on the district and community levels in Búzi, Mozambique through the integration of different datasets (census, Remote Sensing; weighting of indicators, ...).
The research is funded through Munich Re Foundation.

Further information is available following this link.

New Professor in Location Based Services

Dr. Euro Beinat has been selected for the new endowed chair in 'Geoinformatics - Location Based Services' at Salzburg University. Starting from Jan 1, Prof. Beinat will be assigned to the Centre for Geoinformatics as well as to the Department of Geography and Geology and will offer classes and thesis supervision in LBS. The June 2008 summer school in LBS will be one of next year's highlights. Prof. Beinat's research is focussed on realtime location awareness, development of location based systems for highly dynamic and critical environments, and a social science perspective on dynamic cities. Current research initiatives are jointly implemented together with the SENSEable City Lab at MIT Boston and the SPINlab at VU Amsterdam.