ABSTRACT
This final chapter reviews the value of geospatial information while looking forward. This future look is partly based on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development established by the United Nations (UN), including Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and associated targets. In order for the goals and targets to be implemented and achieved, strengthening geospatial data production and understanding of how better geospatial data could be used in policy-making and monitoring is critical. Many of the SDG targets are thematically based and geographic in nature. While the United Nations and the SDGs are considered a global effort, decisions that are made at national, regional, and local levels significantly benefit from geospatial information. Using location as the unifying unit of analysis, knowing where people and things are, and their relationship with each other, are essential for informed decision-making. Despite the societal imperatives and intrinsic value of data, it is still difficult to exactly quantify the value of geospatial information and examine how its societal benefits develop and accrue over time.
Another way of looking into the future of the value of geospatial information is to consider it as an activity of performance management. Some previous book chapters were devoted to geospatial information as a performance metric for measuring changes due to management actions applied to environmental resources and the built environment. In other chapters, the valuation exercise produces a performance metric that pertains to the management of geospatial information. If we consider geovaluation (i.e., valuation of geospatial information) as a new example of performance management, we can expect that the growing GEOValue community will apply a wider range of disciplinary approaches; information and communication technologies will support and sometimes shape the geovaluation; the current geovaluation studies will be complemented with case studies of how the valuation approaches are used by practitioners; and the community will advance the science of valuation of geospatial information by discovering and promoting better approaches that are valid and reliable, so that valuation studies are consistent, repeatable, and as unbiased as possible.
It should be noted that the objectives of the geospatial information management are keys to the selection and refinement of the GEOValue methodology. Designing an overall framework for geovaluation will continue to be both an objective and a challenge for the GEOValue community, as applications will continue to be more comprehensive, realistic, and critical where resource limitations must be addressed.
