Report on UN, FIG, PC IDEA Special Forum held at INEGI, Mexico

Aguascalienties, Mexico, October 26 & 27, 2004

This report in Spanish 

As a result of a resolution at the Seventh United Nations Regional Cartographic Conference for the Americas held in January 2001 in New York, a Special Forum was hosted by the Government of Mexico through INEGI at their headquarters in Aguascalienties on 26 and 27 October 2004 with a theme of “The Development of Land Information Policies in the Americas”.

The objective of the forum was “to establish an awareness of the economic and social value for decision makers, of the importance of developing land policies that effectively and efficiently incorporate appropriate spatial data infrastructures, including an understanding of the value of integrating the land administration/cadastre/land registration function with the topographic mapping function.

The United Nations issued invitations to Ministers of Government who have responsibility for the above functions, or their senior managers who have a policy responsibility, to attend. Funding support for the forum was received from the Government of Canada through Natural Resources Canada, Government of USA through USGS/FGDC and USAID, World Bank and the Danish Trust Fund, and PAIGH. Facilities and resources were provided by INEGI, and the United Nations contributed administrative support. FIG was tasked with taking the lead role in planning and arranging the Special Forum and contributed a significant amount of time to it.

The program over two days consisted of four keynote papers and seven case study papers followed by a number of discussions sessions, and a session of short presentations and discussions on the challenges facing the Americas with respect to the theme of this forum. There were 116 registrants from 18 countries together with representatives from the United Nations, FIG, PC IDEA, World Bank and PAIGH. A representative of President Fox of Mexico – Dr Luis Manuel Gutierrez Levy, Senior Officer, Ministry of Finance opened the Special Forum.

Following the presentation of papers there was very active discussion on a range of issues including education, capacity building, institutional structures, funding, and spatial data infrastructures.

The outcome of the Special Forum will be a “Aguascalienties Statement”, which will form part of the final report to be tabled at the next UNRCCA to be held in June 2005 in New York.

Papers and presentations can be viewed at here

Picture Gallery

Cathedral in Aguascalientes	Arena in Aguascalientes.
Presenters of case studies from Latin America. Session chaired by Frederic Dinechin, the World Bank.	Panelists at the discussion session on case studies from Europe, Australia, and Canada. Session chaired by Mrs. Barbara Ryan, USGS
John Parker.	Paul van der Molen, FIG Commission 7.
Panelists at the final discussion session chaired by Santiago Borrero	Members of the Steering Committee after the successful conference: John  Parker, Mario Reyes Ibarra, Amor Laaribi and Stig Enemark.
Closing reception at INEGI. John R. Parker, Antonio Hernandez Navarra, and Mario A. Reyes Ibarra	Mexican rhythms at the closing reception at INEGI

Prof. John Parker
12 November 2004