For years now, Canada (ironically, the home of GIS) has been criticized for locking up Geospatial data in government vaults, with sharing and donating data to each other being non-existent (almost) and full of red tape… {I can recall years ago when BC agencies would re-sell digital topos to other agencies, often after lengthy paperwork and red-tape} but that may all be changing with some new standards on Geospatial data. One could think this is the case when you see the latest news from GeoConnections. In an interesting update I received this afternoon, GeoConnections is boasting that as of July 1 (Canada Day) The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat has established the Standard on Geospatial Data for the Government of Canada. According to the news, the Standard will facilitate interoperability across institutions and increase their ability to identify, understand, use, and share geospatial data.And I really like this part… This standard also allows institutions to maximize the reuse of existing mapping and related products. Departments will have until May 31, 2014 to fully implement the standard – see the full announcement HERE or check out details of the standard at GeoConnections
