Seasons greetings from FIG Office

Dear members, FIG representatives, delegates and friends of FIG

Seasons greetings and thanks for 2022

Thank you all for an exciting and different 2022. FIG appreciates all the many members and individuals who actively contribute to and take a role in FIG.

2022 was the year where we could finally meet again in person. It proved the importance of networking and what it actually means to meet in person. We also realised how special this undisturbed time at a conference can be, and how different it is from online meetings. Both meeting forms are valuable - no doubt about this; each with their purpose.

The local organisers from Poland showed an amazing stamnia and managed to organise the FIG Congress 2022 within one year. In the beginning it was not clear whether it would be possible to meet in person, but we believed in it. And it worked with 850 on-site participants and 250 online. There were some hick-ups along the way, but the Polish organisers stayed on track and the Congress was held in Warsaw with great success. Read the report

It was also in Poland that the new Council and President was elected by the General Assembly. Diane Dumashie will take over from Rudolf Staiger as President of FIG from 2023 together with the new elected Vice Presidents Daniel Steudler and Winnie Shiu, and the current Vice Presidents Mikael Lilje and Kwame Tenadu. Read the minutes of the General Assembly

A heartfelt thanks to all who contributed to the FIG agenda during this past year - and especially to the outgoing Vice President Jixian Zhang and to the ten outgoing commission chairs 2019-2022 Winnie Shiu, David Mitchell, Hartmut Müller, Mohd Razali Mahmud, Dan Roman, Maria Henriques, Daniel Paez, Marije Louwsma, Ben Elder and Alan Muse as well as Kwabena Asiama  YS who all helped FIG safe through these past years with new and exciting initiatives and ideas and  with positive energy and spirit.

The last years as President went somewhat different for Rudolf Staiger than expected. He, together with his council managed to navigate through these turbulent and different times. Thank you very much, Rudolf! As a final tribute to the outgoing President the "Article of the Month" in December 2022 has been selected to be the video recording of the final keynote session in which Rudolf Staiger together with  Robert Olszewski, Poland, focus on the future technologies of geospatial data visualization and its role for surveyors and the role of GNSS measurements in future. Read more

A festive hand over ceremony was held in connection with Intergeo 2022 in Essen Germany. There were several online and onsite commission and network events during the year, several publications were published and a lot of other activities in and around FIG - all in all a productive and inspiring year is now coming to an end. You can read more about some of all activities from council, commissions, networks, permanent institutions and the current task force on FIG and the SDGs in this news overview of the most recent activities.

Happy New Year 2023

We are now looking into another exciting year - happy New Year 2023.

This year will bring us a new leadership - a new council and president, ten new commission chairs with enthusiastic ideas as well as new and exciting undertakings. At the General Assembly in May/June 2023 FIG Council, Commissions, Networks, Task Forces and the Permanent Institutions will present their new work plans for the coming four years 2023-2026. Travelling is getting back to a more normal situation, but will still be supplemented with online meetings where it makes sense.

The main event of the year - the FIG Working Week 2023 will take place 28 May - 1 June in Orlando, Florida, USA. This will be a face-to-face event. The destination of Florida gives the local organisers and FIG the hope that there will be many attendees from especially Northern America, from Latina America, from South America and from the Caribbean region who will meet "the rest of the world" in Orlando. Further to this the venue is located in the Disney World area - another adventure for you...

Do you want to contribute, and do you have a story to tell? There is still time to submit an abstract for the technical programme. It is also possible to attend without submitting an abstract. Register now and secure your attendance.

The very best greetings from all of us in the FIG Office, Claudia, Evelien, Maria and Louise to all of you...