Progis

ProGIS is a Finnish non-profit organization, whose objective is to promote the use of geographic information (GI) and geographic information systems (GIS) for the benefit of the Finnish society, and to operate as a link between producers and users of GI and vendors of GI services and software.

ProGIS fulfils its objective by:

• Functioning as a permanent cooperation body for its members
• Promoting the use, collection and processing of GI and related services by distributing information and making investigations.
• Organizing seminars
• Following the international developments within the GI field and participating in international activities
• Making initiatives to promote the use of GI, eliminate problems in using GI and develop standards, recommendations and legislation

As members of ProGIS, organizations and individuals can have influence on the development of the Finnish GI co-operation and its status within the society. ProGIS also represents Finnish expertise in the European GI umbrella organization EUROGI.

Members

ProGIS has roughly 40 organizations and 200 individuals as members. Member organizations include private companies and government and municipal organizations.

Member organizations:

Affecto Finland Oy
Bentley Finland Oy
Blom Kartta Oy
CSC, the Finnish IT center for science
Esri Finland Oy
Fifth Element Oy
Fingrid Oyj
Finnish Consulting Engineers - Sito
Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE)
Finnish Maritime Administration
Finnish Road Administration (Finnra)
FlexiTon Kft
Forestry Development Centre Tapio
Geoaudit Oy
Geostar Oy
Geotrim Oy
Helsinki Metropolitan Area Council (YTV)
HKL Helsinki City Transport
Intergraph Finland Oy
Keypro Oy
Logica Suomi Oy
Metsähallitus
Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry
Ministry of the Environment
MTT Agrifood Research Finland
National Land Survey of Finland
Navinova Oy
Population Register Centre
Pöyry Environment Oy
Ramboll Finland Oy
Skandig-Systems Oy
Spatialworld Oy
Statistics Finland
Tampere university
Tekla Oyj
The Geological Survey of Finland (GTK)
TietoEnator Government Oy
Topographic Service of the Finnish Defence Forces
Vaasa Polytechnic
Vianova Systems Finland Oy
VR-Track Ltd
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland

Board

The board of ProGIS consists of ten members and a secretary. President of the board is Tuuli Toivonen (University of Helsinki, tuuli.k.toivonen[at]helsinki.fi) and the vice president is Minna Halonen (VTT, Technical Research Centre of Finland, firstname.surname@vtt.fi).

ProGIS Industry roundtable

The ProGIS Industry roundtable is a voluntary form of co-operation for GI service enterprises. There are about 25 GI service providers, which represent the whole field of Finnish GI data providers, software vendors, application developers and consultants.

The activity of the industry roundtable varies somewhat. At least once a year the contact persons of the companies involved have an informal gathering to discuss the GI market and future possibilities.

The aim of the industry roundtable activities is to represent the service enterprises within the ProGIS activities; to promote the use of geographic information and related techniques.

ProGIS Theses Award and ProGIS honorable mention

ProGIS grants an annual Theses Award for 1-3 meritorious university or polytechnic level end theses. The awarded theses have to be of high quality in addition to preferably bringing something new into the research or innovations in the GI field. The awards are granted at the annual GI fair. The theses to be awarded are chosen from theses made during the year, based on applications sent to the secretary of ProGIS.

The first ProGIS Honorary Mention was granted in 2005. The objective of granting the Honorable Mention is to draw attention to the importance of promoting the use of GI in the society. The honorable mention can be given to a person, community or corporation for increasing the knowledge about geographic information in Finland with an action or an innovation. The board of ProGIS decides upon the honorary mention annually.