Smart Geospatial Expo 2018 Slated for Sept. 12-14

The Smart Geospatial Expo 2018 will take place at COEX in Seoul from Sept. 12 through Sept. 14.

The government will plunk down 303.1 billion won on a combined 771 projects to develop spatial information, core infrastructure of the 4th Industrial Revolution, and create jobs.
The 2018 plan to implement spatial information policies was finalized after it was deliberated by the state spatial information committee, chaired by Minister Kim Hyun-mee of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT). The committee is a governing body of overseeing and coordinating policies on spatial information.
Spatial information is the digital connection between location, people and activities. Spatial information is utilized for road navigation, taxi and buses, and playing virtual reality games. Self-driving cars, drones, smart cities and multidisciplinary convergence to support new industries in an era of the advent of the 4th Industrial Revolution are highlighted of late.
The 2018 action plan on spatial information has finalized 771 spatial information projects. It is the central and local governments’ annual action plan of the 6th master plan on national spatial information between 2018 and 2022, established in May 2018.
The 771 projects for 2018 are up 49 cases from the previous year – five more projects for the central government and 44 more cases for local governments. A shift from the establishment of new data centers to the maintenance stage has brought about a budgetary reduction of 10.2 billion won, but the 2018 plan reflects a rising frequency of utilizing spatial information.
The MOLIT established and implemented annual action plans in accordance with the 5th master plan on national spatial information between 2013 and 2017.
Indoor spatial information on 24 sport venues and facilities was established during the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games to offer mobile road navigation and other services. Last December, the ministry announced a spatial information R&D innovation roadmap to build the groundwork to carry out spatial information R&D in a systematic fashion under a vision of “smart land creating spatial information and convenient, safe life.”
In April 2017, the ministry signed an MOU on joint use of spatial information with 13 government agencies, including the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries and the Statistics Korea.
The opening of spatial information has been pushed on a continuous basis to enhance the private sector’s utilization of spatial information. Civic advisory meetings were convened on four occasions in 2017 to gather diverse views on consumer-oriented opening of spatial information.
The ministry supported such events as the Convergence Startup Festival held in May 2017 and the Idea Contest that took place from May through September 2017.
The 2018 action plan on spatial information calls for innovating a spatial information production regime, ensuring connection and sharing efficiency, nurturing the spatial information industry, establishing advanced spatial information and developing technologies under the vision of thee 6th master plan on national spatial information between 2018 and 2022, “Realizing Salubrious, Affluent, Smart Korea through Spatial Information Convergence Renaissance.” The plan contains a scheme to establish a database on 10 categories, including boundary, structure, and transportation, for frequent updating in place of the conventional interval of two years.
The development of a payload for the first land survey satellite has been completed, and the development of the second satellite has been already launched. The design of the structure of a satellite information utilization center will be completed this year to enhance spatial information production efficiency.