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INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR PHOTOGRAMMETRY AND REMOTE SENSING 
Commission VI 
Symposium held in Mainz, FR Germany, 22 - 25 September 1982 
PROPOSED P ROPE SST ON AY STRATE'Y 
TO STRENGTHEN AND ENHANCE T H.E 
PROFESSION I.N DIFFERENT 
COUNTRIES 
A. Denis N. Fernando 
Ministry of Mahaweli Development, Colombo, Sri Lanka 
ABSTRACT 
In quite a few countries on our globe, the capabilities of photogrammetry 
and remote sensing are not used to the full benefit of these nations. There- 
fore, an attempt is made to strengthen the professional strategy. Based on 
the historical evolu tion in some developing countries, a feasible staffing 
is discussed. Proposals are presented to remedy discrimination and frustra- 
tion of genuine country experts. A plea is made to establish an Institution 
controlling and enhancing professionalism. 
1. Historical Development 
Since I am not competent to present the needs of the developed world, I would 
wish to focus only the needs of developing countries and I would therefore 
restrict my comments to those pertaining to the needs of the Developing 
World. 
Historically the developing countries were very much or totally dependent 
on the colonial powers that governed the destinies of those countries dur- 
ing colonial domination of these countries. Invariably the professionals 
Of the developing world were not allowed to hold high positions of respons- 
ibility and authority in the fields of surveying and mapping, as it was un- 
derstandably critical from the point of view of strategy of those countries 
as well as for reasons of security. Therefore, the individual developing 
countries had very little competent indegenous staff to handle jobs that 
require innovative thinking and application. The staff of the developing 
countries comprised (if they were lucky) mainly of indegenous staff of rout- 
ing technical levels of education as the higher posts of authority and re- 
sponsibility were held by expatriote from the colonial countries. 
There were some countries, however, that were luckier, in that, some of their 
indegenous staff were trained as full professionals. When independence came 
to the developing countries, almost overnight the staff that held lower po- 
sitions were skyrocketed to higher positions that required specialised 
knowledge, not only to execute the routine operations but also to direct 
surveys and mapping operations at a higher technical level. 
Historically therefore many of the indegenous staff did not have the com- 
petence and experience as they were not exposed to these situations and also 
as their knowledge was limited as they were not trained. In such a situation 
the management of such organisations weakened. The little knowledge that 
Bibliographic quotation : 
Fernando, D. : Proposed professional Strategy to strengthen and enhance the profession in 
different countries. In : Int.Archive of Photogrammetry, 24 - VI, pp 321 - 332, 
Mainz 1982