6th Asia Oceania Regional Workshop on GNSS

Welcome Speech
Dr.Pichet DurongKeveroj
Minister of Science and Technology
The 6th Asia Oceania Regional Workshop on GNSS
October 10, 2014
The Royal Raradise Hotel and Spa, Phuket

Honourable speakers, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen.

I would like to express my gratitude to the presence of all delegates, speakers and participants in The 6th Asia Oceania Regional Workshop on GNSS. It's a great pleasure to welcome you all to Thailand, especially to Phuket, the pearl of the Andaman sea.

In thailand, the development of mult-GNSS application and its utuluzation are of great significance. We put a great effort to establish the sharing of information, the exchange of views and perspectives among countries of 6th Asia Oceania Regional as we successfully hosted the first of this workshop in Bangkok, the captial of Thailand since the year 2010. We are very excited to witness the continuation of the effort which brings us back together here once again for The 6th Workshop.

GNSS and its application has promised a great benefit to the society, economically and socially. the design and development of novel GNSS-related devices can help propel the semiconductor industry from a substantial demand for new parts and instruments to support the manufacturing of new devices. Agricultural community can benefit significantly from the shift of manual production to an automated one using precise positioning machinery. Less fuel usage by precise positioning control results in less carbon footprint, thus, provide environmental benefit as well. New curriculums are being developed in various parts of the world to fulfill the need for a new breed of knowledgable graduate which will be in a great demand to support the vast utilization of multi-GNSS technology. Social and economic from life saving during disaster is, indeed, unmeasurable. And even retail community can get the benefit of this technology by having a novel approach of location-based marketing.

Benefit from the application of multi-GNSS seems to be unfathomable. Imagination can push us further in the land of innovation where we might never thought something would exist. The exchange of thought and knowledge in indispensable to the advance of the multi-GNSS community and this annual workshop serve as a roundtable for all the world-class GNSS knight to socialize.

Prior to the opening ceremony of the workshop, during yesterday afternoon, there was a tutorial session on GNSS positioning technology. A wide range of topics was covering, from GNSS applications, software library, to information cooperation with a poster sesion aferwards. The tutorial has proven to be net only informative but also challenged, excited and inspired. This could signify the intensity of knowledge sharing and debate for the incoming sessions for this workshop today and tomorrow.

I'm optimistic that all participants will acquire new knowledge from the two-day workshop and I would encourage all participants to take active parts in the interesting discussion and to joinly develop proposals for new collaborative project.

I am very much thankful to the Growing NAVIS Project, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Satellite Positioning research Application Center, and QZS System Services Inc for their diligent work in preparing for this workshop. Also, I am very thankful for the United Nations International Committee on GNSS, the International Global Navigation Satellite Systems Service for their great support to make this event possible. I want to say once more on behalf of Thailand's National Science and Technology Development Agency, welcome. I wish all delegates and participants a fruitful workshop and a joyful stay in the marvellous island of Phuket.

Thank you.