GMES: good for environment, good for jobs!

Brussels, 4-12-2012 — /europawire.eu/ — GMES, Global Monitoring for Environment and Security, the European Commission’s earth observation programme will create 83 000 jobs in Europe by 2030. This is the result of a study presented by European Commission Vice-President Antonio Tajani today during the London conference “European Space Solutions”, an initiative of the European Commission, hosted by the UK Space Agency. GMES’s primary objective is to provide information services giving access to accurate data in several environmental and security fields and tailored to users’ needs.

Initial results show that GMES will stimulate economic growth and employment in a wide range of industrial sectors, and by 2030 will lead to the creation or maintenance of approximately 20 000 direct jobs in Europe, if enabling factors are put in place. With highly skilled jobs in this sector typically impacting employment in other sectors, the GMES-related economic stimulus could also result in a wider economic effect, with an additional 63 000 indirect jobs secured by 2030.

European Commission Vice President Antonio Tajani, Commissioner for Industry and Entrepreneurship, said that this study demonstrates “that ecological and economical goals can be mutually beneficial; in other words environmental sustainability and the management of natural resources can promote economic development. This GMES report confirms that European space policy will have a significant impact on economic growth and creation of jobs, as predicted by our industry communication of October 2012. European space applications will also boost innovation and create and maintain industry production in Europe.”

GMES report website

London Conference: European Space Solutions

GMES and Earth Observation satellites in support of many economic sectors

In a world facing increased risk of natural and other disasters, GMES aims to monitor the state of the environment on land, at sea and in the atmosphere and also to improve citizens’ security. But at the same time, as the study reveals, GMES can be a driver for economic growth and employment, with the potential impact of almost 85 000 jobs over the period 2015-2030.

Building on a full and open access principle, GMES’s data and information policy will allow the release of a great deal of data, free of charge. A large variety of users can then create value-added products and sell them, generating new markets or enlarging existing ones. GMES and Earth Observation satellite data can support the development of useful applications for a number of different industry segments (e.g. agriculture, insurance, transport, and energy) creating an attractive downstream services market. Examples include precision agriculture or the use of data for risk modelling in the insurance industry. Several of these applications will be demonstrated during today space solution conference.

GMES is hence not only a tool for re-industrialisation for the space industry itself, but through its downstream sector, can trigger different economic activities. An example of this is precision agriculture, or the use of data for risk modelling in the insurance industry.

GMES services are already available

GMES is composed of satellites and in-situ monitoring stations. Two services are already operational: the land service and the emergency service. Since the start of its operations on the 1st of April 2012 the emergency service has completed around twenty concrete interventions. To give one example, four hours after the the earthquake in Emilia, new reference maps were available. The other four services, Atmosphere, Marine, Climate Change and Security, will soon enter into the operational phase. The launch of the first Sentinel satellites is scheduled for 2013 and GMES will be fully operational by 2014, providing Europe’s decision makers with a unique information system for evidence-based policymaking.

Background

GMES is one of the European Flagships Space Programmes. GMES stands for ‘Global Monitoring for Environment and Security’ and is an Earth Observation (EO) long-term programme jointly undertaken by the European Commission, its Member States, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Environment Agency (EEA).

The study, conducted by SpaceTec Partners on behalf of the European Commission, investigated the economic impact of the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security programme (GMES) beyond the institutional sector, with a focus on the downstream market.