Patron of INTERGEO

As the patron of INTERGEO, it is my pleasure to cordially welcome you with a “Grüß Gott” to Munich this year for the world’s leading convention and trade fair for geodesy, geospatial data and land management.

When it comes to collecting and processing data, you all, ladies and gentlemen, literally have a far-sighted vision. Geospatial data spans the globe and is even collected from space. It connects various kinds of information and helps us to link, locate and evaluate a wide range of data. For example, knowing how far away the nearest school is from a given flat could be decisive when people with young children are planning the next phase of their life. Geospatial data makes a valuable contribution to more efficient infrastructure development as well as effective climate change adaptation and civil protection. Geospatial data connects everything from “small” personal matters to “big” societal matters. There is hardly any data that spans as many kilometres or covers information from a wide range of fields and areas of life as geospatial data. This makes geospatial data particularly valuable.

However, geospatial data is not only valuable for businesses, the research community and public administration, but also for aggressors. Geospatial data can be used against us all, against industry and society. It is therefore necessary to balance the risks of providing the public with unlimited valuable geospatial data against this data’s added value for society as a whole. As our world is currently changing very rapidly, this balancing act repeatedly confronts us with challenges; it needs to be re-evaluated on a regular basis. This applies not only to global policy, but also to our budgets.

In these times, we need smart and inexpensive solutions to achieve our goals. In this context, the high level of digitalisation of geospatial data and the enormous innovation potential in your sector are very helpful. This is because fast, comprehensive and digital processing of information can provide a solid basis for decision-making, which is essential for better decisions by federal, state and local governments.

I would like to wish everyone attending INTERGEO 2026 interesting and inspiring encounters and discussions. Thank you very much for your work.