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The President
Bruce McCormack, the President of the Irish Organisation for Geographical Information (IRLOGI) was elected on 25 March 2011 as the new President of EUROGI for the term 2011-2013.
Bruce grew up in Durban, South Africa and after leaving school in 1966 obtained a Bachelor of Social Science degree (majors in Sociology and Economics) and a Master of Science in Town and Regional Planning degree. Both degrees were from the University of Natal.
He worked as a planner in the planning department of the Natal Provincial Administration but left the Administration in 1989 to start his own planning consultancy business. By 1998 the firm had 36 staff and was undertaking planning, engineering, community development, environmental and other types of work within the Province which is now called KwaZulu-Natal. Bruce spent many years working in shack settlements where his focus was on upgrading and community development.
In 2001 he was recruited by the Irish government to work as a planner in the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government. Bruce, his wife one of his daughters moved from South Africa to Ireland to take up the position. Whilst with the Department he has been involved in national spatial planning policy matters.
Since 2002 Bruce has been involved in policy and implementation issues associated with the Irish Spatial Data Infrastructure (ISDI). He chaired the ISDI Work Group, the body tasked with moving the ISDI forward in Ireland, represented Ireland on the INSPIRE Expert Group and played a central role in shaping Ireland's contributions during the drafting of the INSPIRE Directive. Currently Bruce is on both the ISDI/INSPIRE Steering and Technical Committees. He is currently taking a leading role in developing a planning information system which meets INSPIRE requirements.
In 2002 Bruce became the Department's representative on the IRLOGI Executive committee and in 2004 he was elected President. Since that time he has held both President and Vice President on a number of occasions. He has initiated a variety of initiatives including the establishment of an annual IRLOGI Awards Scheme, a Volunteer Scheme linking with a research and training body in Nairobi, an IRLOGI International Business Club and interaction with Cabinet Ministers aimed at raising the profile and usage of GI and GIS in government.
In 2005 Bruce attended his first EUROGI Executive Committee meeting as the IRLOGI representative and in 2007 he was elected Vice President. He has been involved in a range of EUROGI activities including leading the International Affairs Working Group (representing EUROGI on the Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association Board, developing contacts with the European Commission officials dealing with European aid to developing countries, developing contacts across Africa and representing EUROGI at the UN Economic Commission for Africa GI/SDI working meetings, attending GSDI Association conferences), contributing towards the EUROGI re-engineering process over the last few years, and generally contributing to ongoing EUROGI decision making.
Bruce has identified a number of key challenges for EUROGI in the coming years, including supporting SDI development in Central and Eastern Europe and contributing to the process of shaping new EU funding programmes which have a GI/SDI component. He is also keen on strengthening links with other European level organisations which are involved in the GI/SDI sector, both within and outside the Commission. A particular focus will be to obtain a clearer understanding of the future spatial data environment where there are literally billions of location aware sensors and transmitters (RFIDs, mobile phones etc) and how EUROGI can make a positive contribution. International affairs will remain an important focus.