Presentation for the Hungarian Association CASCADOSS during the workshop for a building Spatial Data Infrastructure in the South East Europe. Presentation of the GIS and SDI situation in Greece by Evkartenn with sponsoring of ERFC:

1. ERFC, Arnaud DELEURME
Hungarian CASCADOSS Association, Szeged (Hun), 2nd June 2011
Geographical Information Systems and
Spatial Data Infrastructures
in Greece

2. Plan
1- Brief geography
2- Offer in Greece
3- Situation of INSPIRE application
4- SDI in Greece
Conclusion
Some opportunities?

3. 1- Geography
● Population/Demography
● Services
● Industry
● Administrative Units
Cartogramm by D.Pappas, http://www.hellasgi.gr

4. 1.1 Population in Greece
● By the National Greek Statistics
Agency (2001), Greece= 10 M.
inhabitants.
● Athens=3M. inh.
Thessaloniki=700,000 inh.,
Patra= 200,000
● Unofficially, Athens > 4M.,
Thessaloniki >1M.,
Patra=400,000...
Sources: http://geografikadiamerismataelladas.blogspot.com

5. 1.2 Services in Greece
● Concentration in Athens
(major place)
● A second place in
Thessaloniki (minor place)
● Map of Flight network
represents very well the
place of Athens
Source: http://www.harrys-greece-travel-guide.com

6. 1.3 Industry in Greece
● Two places in Greece
● Dusting industry in all the
Greece.(Volos and Patra)
● First and Important place
of Athens
Source: http://mapas.owje.com

7. 1.4 Administrative units
● Before 1st January 2011, 13
peripheries, 54 prefectures
and 1033 municipalities and
communities.
● After 1st January 2011,
Kallikratis Plan, 7 decentralized
administrations, 13 peripheries
and 325 municipalities

8. Kallikratis Plan 2011
Before... Now...

9. 2 – Offer in GIS/geomatics technology
● Softwares
● Companies
● Data
● Freelancers, NGO,
associations, communities
● Universities and events

10. 2.1 Offer in softwares
● ESRI© Company takes the first place in the greek GIS
market (ArcGIS® software is generally installed in public
municipalities).
● Intergraph© solutions, take the Second place of sales
● MapInfo© solutions and Manifold
● Different GIS solutions but without an important
representative place

11. 2.2 Offer by companies
● More Companies in Athens and few companies in
Thessaloniki, majority of sales and projects take place in the
urban region of Athens (Attica),
● More 50 companies by personal survey and >60% are in Urban
area of Athens
● Marathondata has offices in the 2 cities,
● Greek companies represent some international GIS Software
companies : ESRI, Intergraph, Autodesk, MapInfo, Manifold...
● Some companies offer customized solutions

12. 2.2 Offer by companies
● Many companies offer customized applications on basis
of Licensed GIS software: ESRI is generally used.
● Open Source solutions are not represented significantly
in the Greek companies.

13. 2.3 Data
● There is a lack of data, it explains a late in use of public
data,
● No mutualization approach for the public data, no
license process in order to share the data between
different public authorities. There is no NSDI,
● Many versions of the same data, so a high cost,
● Private data try to cover the hole of the public data,

14. 2.3 Data
● The public authorities sell the same data many times,
● Public data has a restrictive copyright,
● Some data are out-of-date (public national topographic
reference),
● Development of private data with a commercial use :
Referential maps for GPS/navigation
● Cadastral data is not ready

15. 2.4 Associations,NGO and freelancers
● Freelancers represent a great community of GIS users.
They work independently (minor) or by contract in private
companies (majority),
● GIS users/specialist in Greece are from multiple domains
like: geography, topography, spatial planners, foresters,
environmentalists..
● Associations and NGO are few and they are generally
based in Athens

16. 2.4 Associations,NGO and freelancers
● Some quite active communities like: Hellas GI, ELLAK,
Topographers and Geomatics Students associations.
● They NGO and associations have more a role of
information and dissemination.
● They take an important place in seminars/conference
organization (HellasGI and ELLAK)

17. 2.4 Associations,NGO and freelancers
● OSGeo – Greek Chapter regroup 27 members. No
official association. No real organization. Based on
volunteers actions (translation, tutorials, seminars and
training...).
● Mailing list and Annual report
(2007-2008-2009) but it is calm ...

18. 2.5 Universities and events
● Universities take an important place for the transfer knowledge of
GIS and Geo-sciences. It is the principal tool for the education in
GIS technology
● Five locations are ''fulled'' concerned by the GIS Education in
Greece: Athens, Thessaloniki, Volos, Serres, Mythilini
● Some Masters in GIS and geomatics technology exist but they
are not opened on the Balkans area (in Greek). Concurrence by
the Masters in G.Britain and Holland.

19. 2.5 Universities and events
● No strong relation between the laboratories and the
companies,
● Geopolitic place of Greece is not exploited for the GIS
cross-border education, closed inside its border.
● Few national events take place in Greece, organized by
Universities, NGO and associations, some International
seminars per year...

20. 3.INSPIRE in Greece
● Law of 20 Sept.2010
about the creation of the
NSDI to implement the
INSPIRE Directive
● Law for sharing public
data for free
● New organization to
implement the NSDI

21. 3.1 New organization
● National Framework of E-Government : e-GIF
● Technical framework: National Framework for Interoperability of
Geo-Information and Services
● At the Government side: National Committee of Geo-Information
● At the Public Services side: OKXE is the National Referee (National
Organism of Cartography and Cadastre). It represent the Greece at
the INSPIRE Committee
● KOSE or Focus Points manage the relations with the public services
(relations with the geospatial data)

22. 3.2 New dynamic
● Central place of the National Reference (OKXE)
● Represents Greece at INSPIRE committee
● Builds, manages, develops the NSDI
● Informs, supports the Focus points
● Purposes at the National Committee Geo-Information
● Important place of the Focus Points (KOSE)
● Coordination for creating spatial data catalog in the public authorities
● Update the Spatial data/services catalog

23. GOVERNMENT s/ E.U
Ad opt NF Geo-Inf. takes place
id es
dec NSDI
Nat. Committee
NFIGS
of Geo-Inf.
designs/develops/
Proposes/Assists manages/supervises INSPIRE
Participates Committee
represents
coordinates/informs
Focus Points recommends
Public administration
Working Thematic
Public administration Group (WTG)
PUBLIC SECTOR PRIVATE SECTOR

24. 3.3 New expectations in Greece
● New data uses in Greece from the public data providers to the
third part
● Data for free if non-commercial use and with licence
● Available metadata and webservices for a full knowledge of
existing data
● New position of Greece with the Greek NSDI in the European
NSDI network
● New technologies by setting up of the NSDI

25. 4- SDI in Greece
● An old need in 2000 - Nagii or
NaGi2: National Geographic
Information Infrastructure
● Since 2010, real evolution about the
NSDI
● More information with Websites
● Portals and Geoportals
http://geodata.gov.gr/
● Seminars and events about the
future NSDI

26. 4.1 NSDI
● Portals and Geoportals (not NSDI)
http://geodata.gov.gr/about greek spatial
data. They have no responsability.
Available for applications
● Demo Application for the greek users
powered by Institute for the Management
of Information Systems, Open Government
team and ELLAK society.
● Metadata are available since December
2010 in XML, spatial data available in SHP,
GML, KML
● → Not yet installed, just a demoI

27. 4.2 Others examples of Greek SDI
● No other Greek example of SDI !
● Just one by a Greek partner in EU project:
● IDE-UNIVERS: http://www.ideunivers.eu
● Interreg IIIB Project MEDOCC in 6
languages (Greek)
● Portal and Geoportal
● Greek Partner is Univ.of Aegean
● Open Sources tools
http://geo-ellanikos.aegean.gr/ideunivers/

28. 4.2 Others examples of Greek SDI
● Some experiences by EU projects
● Example of the SDI-EDU project (http://sdi-edu.zcu.cz) about the
Education Transfer in relation with the INSPIRE Directive knowledge
● Duration of 24 months, 10 partners and organization of Training
Workshops in 6 countries
● Knowledge for the Spatial Planners and how to applicate the
directive in the spatial planning processes
● Portal and GeoPortal (Viewer Map+GeoCatalog)

29. 4.3 Expectations for SDI in Greece
● No experience of SDI in Greece
● INSPIRE Directive is a new topic. Famous since 2010 and not before in
Greece
● Few persons know about SDI, INSPIRE, OGC, webservices...harvesting. They
are from universities and few companies
● Future for SDI ...if...financed projects from EU.
● No own wished to build (just geoportal.gov.gr) if no funds
● Expectation of development in parallel with the future Greek Cadastre

30. Conclusion
● Monopole of one GIS Software in all the sectors (research,
public, private...)
● Lack of data and a lack of applications in the public services
● A new organization for the NSDI project but not effective yet
● A lack of knowledge about INSPIRE, SDI, OGC and
interoperability concept
● No important seminars about Geomatics nor studies about SDI
● Minimum of cross-border research/works

31. Opportunities
● Real needs of knowledge about SDI and Interoperability concepts
(harvesting process, standards...)
● Set up a cross-border SDI for a first example of efficient application (only one real
SDI was in EU project...)
● Need of a strong an effective SDI (support team)
● Need to change the behavior with the spatial data uses (License)
● Need of new technologies use : Web-Services, Open Source solutions and
projects
● Need to support more Open Source applications (Economic crisis background)

32. Sources
● Poulicos Prastakos,The GIS in the Hellenic area, Problems and
perspectives, 2007 (in Greek)
● Konstantinos Nedas, The application of the INSPIRE Directive in
Greece: NSDI 2010-2011 (in Greek)
● Konstantinos Nedas, Introduction to the NSDI, place of the
Focus Points, 2010 (in Greek)

33. Contact
● Arnaud DELEURME, European Regional
Framework for Co-operation, Greece
Mail: info@evkartenn.com
WebSites: www.erfc.gr / www.evkartenn.com