FURTHER PROGRESS WITH GLOBAL EARTH OBSERVATION PLAN.

• Position: Brief Article

The Inter-governmental Group on Earth Observation (GEO) is due to meet on September 28 in Brussels to try and agree on the shape of an historic international plan to co-ordinate all the observation systems scattered around the world. Launched last year in Washington, during the first Earth Observation Summit, the GEO is tasked with acting over a 10-year period to develop an efficient observation system: the GEOSS or Global Earth Observation System of Systems. The plan is due to be adopted during the third Earth Observation Summit, which will take place in Europe for the first time, next February in Brussels.

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The need to develop a system or set of comprehensive Earth systems, on a co-ordinated and perennial basis, is acknowledged at the highest international political level. Back in September 2002, during the Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development, a call was made for better co-ordination of the Earth observation systems and research programmes focused on integrated EOS. In June 2003, the G-8 Summit, held in...