Category: Grant stories

OSGeo Oceania is proud to be a sponsor of the 2026 Pacific Islands GIS & Remote Sensing User Conference.

For nearly three decades, the Pacific GIS and Remote Sensing Council (PGRSC) has brought together the region’s geospatial community from a two-day national GIS conference in Fiji back in 1998, through its growth into the “Pacific Islands GIS&RS User Conference” in 2004, to its establishment as an independent council in 2018. Today it stands as the largest GIS and Remote Sensing conference in the Pacific, drawing government agencies, scientists, private sector partners and international researchers together to tackle real challenges with Pacific voices leading the conversation.

At OSGeo Oceania, our purpose is to support and grow the open geospatial community across Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands, and there’s no better way to do that than by standing behind an event with PGRSC’s track record. This sponsorship is our way of celebrating the incredible work of geospatial professionals all across Oceania and helping ensure the conference continues to thrive for decades to come.

We can’t wait to connect with the community in Suva this November!

Greg Lauer attended GeoCart in Wellington. He said it was “Great to see many presentations talking about Open Source and/or Open Data”, and “Karl (LINZ) gave out great kudos for North Road’s work on their QGIS plugin.”

The Geography Teachers Association of Queensland recently held their annual conference at the end of July, so we thought it would be great to have a presence there.

We enticed the attendees with some of the great merch from previous FOSS4G conferences and a selection of cartographic books. Ian, Greg and myself manned the store and it was a bonus that the volume of the Digital Atlas of Design we had on display was the one that Ian’s map was published in!

We talked to the teachers about FOSS4G offerings and how to bridge geospatial with other disciplines like programming and science courses. We also introduced the Humanitarium Open Street Map tasking opportunities to run as mapathons in schools.

This was a great opportunity to think about where we could go with the provision of educational resources such as academic exercises, a guide for schools in FOSS4G adoption, and how to run a HOT Task session.

The Emerging Spatial Professionals New Zealand organised a Geospatial Careers Evening at University of Auckland bringing together students, recent graduates, and industry seniors to discuss insights into the New Zealand geospatial industry.

Funding for the event was provided by OSGeo Oceania.

You can learn more about the group here.

The Geospatial and Surveying Society Tasmania aka GEOSS Tas hosted a free night of mapping and pizza.

Extending on the GEOSS Humanitarian Mapathon event in 2025, the activity for this year was a weekly mapping session for the first month of the semester, where students participated in ongoing humanitarian mapping tasks. 

There was a mix of new students, their first time using HOTOSM and open-source geospatial tools, and past graduates returning, not currently studying at the university. For most, the event offered an introduction to HOTOSM and demonstrated how their GIS skills can be applied in practical applications.

Funding from OSGeo Oceania meant that students did not have to arrange food, with the event occurring in the evening, and could stay around for the full session.

The recent kickoff Maptime Auckland meetup was a success with 15 people ranging from geospatial professionals to students coming together to discuss geospatial topics and share ideas with each other over free pizza!

Geogeeks has been going strong with Hacknights and Mapping Parties every month.

The Hacknight in March 2026 was held at the usual venue, the Riff (Spacecubed) in the CBD, and well attended.

You can access the Geogeeks calendar to keep updated here: https://geogeeks.org/geogeeks.ics

The Geogeeks website is here: https://geogeeks.org