1. Creation and permanent updating of a homepage on Internet with the following address: http://www.lm.se/fig5

This homepage present Commission 5, activities of the different working groups and future related meetings of Commission 5.

2. Creation and distribution of the first number of FIG Commission 5 Newsletter. In the Newsletter following subjects were presented:

3. C5 participation in ISO standardisation works. Some examples:

4. Working Group meeting of WG 5.1 in Brno prior to the 35th International Surveying Information Days. The future work and the internal constitution of the working group were discussed and outlined. (one day meeting).

5. Working Group meeting of WG-5.2 in Gävle during the seminar, Geodesy and Surveying in the Future, The Importance of Heights, see below.

6. Working Group meeting of WG-5.5 in Gävle during the seminar, Geodesy and Surveying in the Future, The Importance of Heights, see below.

7. Organising and contributing to one afternoon session during the 35th International Surveying Information Days in Brno. Jean-Marie Becker, Hansbert Heister, Vaclav Slaboch, Mikael Lilje and Jiri Lechner presented papers.

8. Organising 15-17 March 1999 in Gävle, Sweden the Jubilee Seminar: 25 years of Motorised Levelling, Geodesy & Surveying in the Future, The Importance of Heights. This seminar was a joint event for FIG C5, NKG (Nordic Commission of Geodesy) Working Group for Height Determination and the Geodetic Divisions at the National Land Survey of Sweden. Also IAG (International Association of Geodesy) participated through their President Klaus Peter Schwarz and many of its members.

The seminar included more than 50 papers covering all aspects about height determination from most scientific to purely practical point of view. The seminar included 12 technical sessions concerning the following subjects:

- Advance in techniques and instrumentation’s for terrestrial height determination

- Applications of modern terrestrial height determination techniques

- Heighting using satellites or other techniques

- Quality control

- Standards

- Different special aspects

- Height Networks

- How to meet & fulfil the user needs?

- Trends in Geomatics

- National reports

- Panel discussion and summary of the seminar

- Technical tours and demonstrations at several stations.

All sessions were well attended by an average of about 100 participants from early morning (08.30) to late evening (18.30). Each speaker disposed 15 minutes for the presentation followed by 5 minutes for discussion. The presentations were of good quality and followed by animated and interesting discussions. In total we had 122 participants (nearly 50 professors) coming from around the world (Canada, Australia, Japan, Israel) but mostly from Europe, Scandinavia and Baltic countries.

The whole seminar and especially the panel discussion of the last day were much appreciated by all participants and we have obtained many mails that expressed the participants satisfaction. As Prof. J Kääriäinen (Finland) said at several occasions this was the best seminar on this subject since long time ago and hopefully similar seminars can be arranged in the future. This seminar contribute also to the good collaboration with other organisation as IAG and NKG for the benefit of all surveyors.

This seminar was possible and successful trough the enthusiastic engagement from Mikael Lilje, P.O. Eriksson, M.Kasser (WG 5.2) and the active help of all the other Chair & Vice Chairmen and several members from C5.

9. Commission 5 Steering Committee (SC5) meeting in Gävle 14 March 1999. During the FIG Congress in Brighton, C5 made a first attempt to have a steering committee meeting. This first meeting allowed to establish the first contact with the different WG chair and to roughly go through the working plans.

The SC5 meeting in Gävle was attempted by a majority of the WG 5 chairmen or their representatives. The items on the agenda covered all FIG, C5 and WG5 activities as example:

All subjects were lively discussed and common resolutions were taken concerning how FIG C5 will handle further one.

10 Commission 5 is through its WG 5.3 (Chair Dr.Naser El-Sheimy) co-organiser of the International Workshop on Mobile Mapping Technology in Bangkok 21-23 April 1999 together with ISPRS. Jean-Marie Becker is participating and representing FIG C5. Several papers will be presented by WG-5.3.

11 Preparation of the activities for the FIG Working Week in Sun City. Responsible for FIG C5 technical program is Vice Chair Matt Higgins. The preparations takes a lot of time and shows that it is not easy to arrange technical sessions in a place as expansive as Sun-City. It is not only difficult to attract speakers from foreign countries but also local surveyors to come and assist at this kind of expensive workshop.