Summary of socialized service of foreign public welfare geological survey data

This paper is a collaboration between the author and Wu Qiang (Associate Research Fellow of China Land and Resources Economic Research Army). World Nonferrous Metals, No.3, 2007

Foreign public welfare geological survey work is basically legal, and it is also a legal obligation for relevant institutions to provide geological survey results to the society. Services should be in place and recognized by the public. Of course, not all these services are free, and some operations are integrated into the commercial operation mechanism. Therefore, whether it is the content, mode or effect of service, there is an invisible hand that can meet the needs of society, but it can be felt. The following is prepared to introduce this in six parts.

1 commercial services under the premise of public welfare

Western developed countries generally have laws on information disclosure, which make it clear that government information and public welfare information must be made public, and the public has the right to know and obtain these information. Due to the relatively perfect market economic systems in these countries, even public welfare undertakings such as socialized service of geological survey results have been integrated into the commercial service mechanism to varying degrees. The specific performance of developing commercial services under the premise of public welfare is to implement the charging system.

Many countries have corresponding provisions on the charges of public welfare information products in their administrative regulations. The general principle is: the provision of relevant information in the public domain should not be for profit, either free or charged, but even if charged, the bottom line is unprofitable; Providing relevant information in the business field can be charged or free, but it is all for profit. Here, some information charging systems in Japan, the United States and the European Union are selected for comparison, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 Comparison of foreign information product charging systems

As far as the data of geological survey results are concerned, except the most basic geological data can be downloaded free of charge through the Internet, most geological data will be charged different fees. Compared with several countries, the United States has the lowest fees and the most free resources, which can meet almost 65% of users' needs. In terms of service charges, geological survey data service charges are called cost recovery abroad, but their purpose is not to really recover costs, let alone make profits, but to better provide socialized services and promote the fair use of public resources. Therefore, by charging a certain fee and introducing a more commercial mechanism, it will help to improve the service quality as much as possible, reduce unreasonable demands for free services, and promote the fair use of government financial resources. Cost recovery accounts for about 2% of expenditure in the United States, 13% in Canada and 30% in Australia. The exact proportion of recycling costs in Britain has not been found yet, but the charging system of geological data in Britain is the most detailed and complicated.

In Britain, the use of digital geological map data is in the form of license, and users must buy a license to use these data. This license is not exclusive and cannot be transferred. The license price is directly related to the scale of geological map, the required area and the required purchase period. From 2003 to 2004, the relationship between different scales and license fees is shown in Table 2.

Table 2 Relationship between digital map data of different scales and license fees in Britain

As can be seen from Table 2, the larger the scale, the higher the cost, and there is a big gap between different cost standards. British license fee is not only related to the scale, but also related to the service life required by users. The license fee for the first year includes data preparation fee (DPC), data usage fee (DUC) and license management fee (LAC). The continued use fee in the second year includes data use fee and license management fee. Where is the information preparation fee? /kloc-between 0/50 and 350, how much is the license management fee? 150。 It should be noted that the data preparation fee in the license fee is a standard data preparation fee. If users need to cut GIS maps, they need to add data preparation fees. The relationship between the license fee of digital map data in Britain and the scale size, area and service life is shown in the table.

Table 3 UK Digital Map Data License Fee

Does Table 3 include the data preparation cost (DPC)? 150 and license management fee (LAC)? 150。 The above license fee is only for a single user (seat/user /PC/ workstation). If it is used by multiple users (seats/users/PCs/workstations), the data usage fee (DUC) will increase with the number of users. For example, there are 2-5 users, which is twice that of DUC, and there are 6- 10 users, which is 3.

Public service is rich in content and diverse in forms.

The commonweal geological data service includes three meanings: first, the service content is extensive, and the geological data services provided by these countries involve almost the whole geological data field, such as regional geological survey, geochemistry, geophysics, hydrogeology, geological disasters, mineral resources, water resources, energy, environment, geological science knowledge and so on. From the depth of service content, large-scale maps can also be provided, and some maps even reach the scale of 1: 10000. Second, the service forms are diverse. Some of the open geological data provided by these countries can be downloaded through the Internet, some can be purchased in designated stores, and some can be ordered by telephone, e-mail and fax. In addition, some information will be provided to the public in the form of periodicals and annual reports. The third is to provide services in electronic format, with rich carriers. Electronic product formats include ASCII files, PDF files, Bentley Microsoft workstation formats (. DGN), ARC/INFO output format (. EOO), arc/view graphic format (. SHP), map information exchange format (. TIFF/。 MID), map information format (. TAB), wavelet compression format (. ECW) and label image file format.

3 Multi-sectoral joint services

With the continuous expansion of the field of geoscience services and the combination of geoscience and celestial exploration, the socialized service of geoscience knowledge and geological data is breaking through the boundaries of geological survey and gradually expanding to other government departments, institutions and commercial institutions. In other words, the services in this area are developing in the direction of multi-department joint operation, and even the services provided by the same department or unit can be handled by different groups according to different topics. For example, although geological products of the Geological Survey of Canada can be purchased in all sales networks, if users want to know more about the performance of the products, they can easily contact the producers and manufacturers of the products directly to obtain first-hand information. The one-stop service project of spatial data being carried out in the United States is a model of multi-sector joint social service of geological data. At present, 19 government departments have joined the project. These departments cooperate to provide unified services to improve the ability of the public and the government to use geospatial data and support commercial services.

4. The service is highly informatized.

The social service of geological data in most countries has a unified portal website, through which users can query the results catalogue and metadata. In some countries, the search system of related products has been quite perfect. Wildcards can be used in queries, and logical relationships (and, NOT, or) can be selected in multi-keyword queries. There are also some countries that use illustrated query methods, not only through keywords, but also directly on the map. For example, the US Geological Survey has adopted Web GIS technology, so users can browse or search on the map directly through the browser. In addition to the perfect query system, most countries' portals have a list of topics, some countries are listed according to their professional nature, some countries are listed in alphabetical order, and some countries are listed in two forms, which can facilitate users to query and find the topics they are interested in directly in the list.

Network is an important way for users to obtain products. Through the network, users can download some products for free, or order the required products through online orders or emails. For example, Canadian users can access 29% of data, American users can access 27% of data, and Australian users can access 8.5% of data. It is worth mentioning that most of these countries jointly provide social services by multiple departments, and the geological products found on the portal may belong to different departments, but this does not affect the services provided by different departments to users through the portal.

With the development and application of digital mapping technology, especially the development of spatial data integration technologies such as 3S and 5S, geological data has been more widely used. In 1970s, digital map technology entered the practical stage, and in 1980s, the United States, Germany, Canada, Britain, France, the Netherlands, Australia and other countries began to make geoscience maps. The application of GIS (Geographic Information System) and related technologies developed later in the field of geosciences has further broadened the content and scope of socialized geological data service. Geographic Information System (GIS) is the product of the combination of geography and computer technology. In the 1960s and 1970s, computer technology was mainly used to deal with problems related to geographical coordinates and solve environmental resources management and planning problems. For example, the world's first GIS (Canadian Geographic Information System -CGIS) was established in Canada to process a large amount of data obtained from land surveys. At present, there are three main ways for GIS to provide geographic information services to the public: ① to provide typical GIS products (including data and software) for electronic maps; ② Providing GIS services to the public through the Internet; ③ Using touch screen in public places to provide GIS services to the public.

5. Pay attention to geological science knowledge service.

Some foreign countries attach great importance to the service of geological popular science knowledge, and improve the public's attention and understanding of geological undertakings by popularizing geological scientific knowledge, thus promoting the development of geological undertakings. On the Internet, Canadian geological science knowledge service mainly adopts three forms: one is Ask-a-georgist. Anyone who is interested in or wants to know about Canadian geosciences can ask questions from experts of the Canadian Geological Survey and ask them to answer them. The questioner only needs to fill in the questions he wants to ask and his email address in the question box, and the experts of the Canadian Geological Survey will return the results to the questioner by email. The second is to popularize geological science knowledge to the public through the educational website of the Canadian Geological Survey. The contents include Canadian landform and topography (briefly described), Canadian climate change poster, inheriting Canadian geoscience tradition, Canadian earthquake, geomagnetic-north magnetic pole, geomagnetic-magnetic declination, urban geology, Canadian landslide, avalanche, sagnac River flood and so on. The third is to provide geological popular science knowledge. This is a popular science geological material specially produced by the Geological Survey of Canada for students and people interested in scientific research, and there are many video materials. The contents mainly include geoscientists, earthquake in Canada, mineral resources in past lives, Canada and Atlantic Ocean in Canadian geological survey, and geological mapping methods. These videos can be borrowed from the Canadian Earth Science Information Center for a short time.

The British Geological Survey also provides the general education of geological knowledge to the public through the network, including: map making, common geological problems, geological year representatives, geological surveys, rocks, British geological science literature, volcanoes, fossils, science and society, earthquakes, geological tourism guides, major geological events and so on. In addition, another feature of British geological science education is popularization, that is, it is easy to be accepted by the public in the form of pictures and texts. For example, when introducing arsenic pollution in groundwater, the typical cases of arsenic pollution in groundwater in Bangladesh are listed and some on-site photos are displayed.

6. Attach importance to the supporting work of socialized services.

In order to promote the socialized service of geological data, foreign countries also attach great importance to the supporting work of socialized service, such as the United States, which has done very successfully in this regard.

(1) Attach importance to social needs and vigorously publicize geological survey data. The US Geological Survey (USGS) attaches great importance to the social demand for geological work and actively promotes the socialized service of geological achievements. For example, set up a special liaison agency to establish long-term and stable contact with government departments, Congress, federal professional committees, enterprises and the public to keep abreast of the social demand for geological work; Through newspapers, television, results conference and other forms, vigorously publicize and popularize geological science and related information achievements.

(2) Pay attention to team building, and extend the socialized service of geological survey data for a long time. Non-profit geological work is regional and professional, which requires a professional team with strong professional knowledge, rich work experience and large data accumulation, as well as relatively stable personnel to complete related tasks and ensure the quality of results. American public geological work can play an important role at home and abroad because USGS has a high-quality and relatively stable professional team. According to the development and change of the situation, the bureau can scientifically formulate the human resources strategy, pay attention to the cultivation and replacement of the talent team, and adjust the professional structure of the team in time. In attracting talents, the US Geological Survey has also adopted the methods of setting up a national research fund and recruiting postdoctoral students majoring in geology, biology and groundwater to work in the bureau.