Geonovum

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About us
Geonovum is the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) executive committee in the Netherlands. The organisation devotes itself to providing better access to geo-information in the public sector. Geonovum develops and manages the geo-standards necessary to implement this goal.

The foundation of Geonovum marks an important step to improve coordination of public sector geographic data in the Netherlands. In its role as enabler of the national geo-information infrastructure, Geonovum connects public sector managers with the workfloor professionals. Geonovum's strength is that it discusses, coordinates and monitors arrangements between the parties concerned with regard to how activities are to be carried out and completed.

Geonovum is a small and flexible organisation and consists of a group of employees, an independent board of directors, an advisory board and a supervisory board. The activities of Geonovum are subsidised by the Ministries of Infrastructure and Environment (IenM), Economy, Agriculture and Innovation (EL&I), the land registry (Kadaster) and TNO.

Goals and tasks
Geonovum is recognisable and professional, result-driven and independent. Its main goals are: 

• to develop and standardise the geo-information infrastructure while also being innovative;
• to build up and disseminate knowledge in the area of geo-information infrastructure;
• to make the geo-information infrastructure more accessible to administrative bodies, institutions and departments in the Netherlands and the European Union.

In order to attain its goals Geonovum has set itself the following tasks:

• to share and make accessible all the geo-information available in the Netherlands;
• to be a think tank in the domain of geo-information;
• to be the 'voice of geo-information' that provides the minister of I&M and the Council for Geo-information with professional advice and relevant knowledge.
• to develop high-quality and widely applicable standards and to monitor their use.

The tasks focus in particular on developing and controlling standards, making up-to-date geo-information accessible, developing knowledge and giving advice to the Council for Geo-information on technology and implementation aspects. Geonovum does not carry out all its tasks itself but calls in third-party help where needed.