July 2011
Dear BARSC Members,
I am writing to introduce myself as the new Chairman of BARSC, having been elected to the role at this year’s Annual General Meeting on 7th June – hopefully you have seen the press release on our website . I would like to thank you for your confidence in electing me to chair the association for the next two years, and to briefly set out my vision for the association and some forthcoming events.
Thank You
Before doing that, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Dave Hodgson for his exemplary chairmanship of the association over the last two years. Under his stewardship BARSC has substantially improved its level of communication and outreach with member companies, has grown its membership and its impact in government and customer circles, and has increased its recognition as the voice of the remote sensing industry. I certainly hope to continue these trends.
I would also like to thank our dedicated Executive Committee without whose support my role would be extremely difficult if not impossible: particular thanks to Gareth Crisford for agreeing to serve as Vice-Chairman for the next two years, and to David Morten and Gareth Davies for agreeing to stay on as Treasurer and Executive Secretary respectively. Special thanks are also due to our administrator Alistair Maclenan who is doing a fantastic job of getting BARSC in the public eye through our website and press releases. I am grateful to all of them for their continued support.
This Year’s Programme
Having been in the chair for a month, I can see that I have a busy two years ahead of me! I have now had a chance to look ahead to the remainder of 2011 and am pleased to say that we have a full calendar of events taking shape:
- A talk on INSPIRE from the Association for Geographic Information (AGI) on 2nd August
- BARSC’s annual lunch event in late September (date TBC), with a prominent guest speaker
- A talk from the National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO) on the 4th October
- A talk from the European Space Agency (ESA) on the 6th December.
These events are open to all BARSC members, so do look out for further announcements of these events via our web site and mailing list – I look forward to seeing you there!
Priorities for the Next Two Years
Separately, we have been pursuing a closer working relationship between BARSC and the National Centre for Earth Observation (NCEO), and we will use the occasion of this year’s NCEO & CEOI Joint Science Conference in September to launch a specific set of collaborative activities between BARSC and NCEO. Again, all BARSC members will be welcome to attend and participate – more details to follow.
More broadly, I would like to use my time as Chairman to help BARSC members derive benefit from the exciting initiatives and opportunities centred around the International Space Innovation Centre (ISIC), both at Harwell and the ‘spokes’ around the UK, and the ESA Climate Office and Business Incubation Centre at Harwell. I think that the downstream applications arena is likely to be a significant area of growth for BARSC member companies in coming years, and Harwell provides a number of facilities to help our sector build capability and capacity in this arena.
I also plan to actively continue BARSC’s work in engaging with the UK Space Agency to provide our sector’s inputs into their decision making processes; a key area for our engagement will be to provide input to the UK SA’s preparations for the ESA Ministerial Conference next year, as well as continuing to represent BARSC member interests at the UK Space Agency’s ‘Ground Segment Working Group’ for GMES matters. A related area of activity is to support the case for a “Space TIC” (Technology Innovation Centre) for the UK, which would give a significant boost to UK industry.
Let Me Know What You Think
I am very open and keen to hear your views on these priorities, and also open to take on additional challenges of importance to BARSC members. If there are important topics I have missed, I would be very pleased to hear from you. This is only the beginning of what I hope will be a fruitful two years for BARSC, and I hope to write to you again early next year to update you on how we are doing and set out our further plans for 2012 and beyond.
My Day Job Goes On
When not working on BARSC matters, I manage the Earth Observation business development activities at Logica, a role which brings me into contact with many BARSC members as well as relevant stakeholders such as ESA, UK SA, the TSB, Defra, NERC and many other organisations. I am also one of the two Vice-Chairmen of EARSC, the European counterpart of BARSC, and am hoping to use my new role to foster greater interaction between the two associations.
Chetan Pradhan | Chairman, BARSC
T: +44 7921 932252 | chairman@barsc.org.uk | www.barsc.org.uk