Dearth of GIS expertise

More expertise is required in the area of geographic information systems, which is attracting commercial interest and not just academic, with companies increasing their use of the technology, Maria Attard, a lecturer within the Geography Division in the University's Mediterranean Institute, said.

The university needs to meet the ever-increasing demand for people trained in this area and is continuing to develop further education in this regard, in line also with the country's ICT strategy. It has made a huge investment in the technology since it introduced the subject 11 years ago, being one of the first universities in Europe to do so, Dr Attard said.

She was speaking at the first international summer school on Geographic Information Systems and Spatial Data, held over the last two weeks.

The summer school is the fruit of collaboration between the International Programmes Unit of Foundation for International Studies Ltd, the University of Malta through its group of companies, Aalborg University in Denmark and the Dublin Institute of Technology.

Representing a new initiative within the International Programmes Unit to provide educational programmes of a specialist academic nature, the summer school aimed at supporting the growing importance of GIS and to encourage the debate, the University of Malta's group of companies CEO, Josef Grech, said.