MalaysiaGIS.com

The registration for land transfer can soon be done in three days instead of the usual period of seven to 12 months once the computerised land registration system (CLRS) is installed across the country. The whole development of CLRS is expected to be completed in about three years, covering the whole of Malaysia and consuming a total investment of RM230 million.

The CLRS is replacing the manual land registration system previously used. Currently, CLRS has been developed in five States with about RM50 million investment.

According to Dato' Dr Nik Mohd Zain Nik Yusof, chief secretary of the Land and Cooperative Development Ministry, the Ministry is currently working on the remaining seven States, involving 71 district offices. This is expected to consume another RM180 million.

A Unix system, CLRS is developed by the Ministry, with technical consultancy from the Central Board for Real Estate Data of Sweden.

The main users of the system are the Department of the Registrar of State grants and the district land offices to process dealings in land matters.

The public can also access the information kept in the system's database remotely with user identifications and passwords.

NALIS
To enable land information to be available online at all Government offices, the Ministry has started the national infrastructure for land information (NaLIS) project.

The project will develop the national spatial data infrastructure to facilitate the sharing of geospatial information (GI) among land related agencies. This will be done by providing online access through the NaLIS home page.

When completed, it will allow the land related agencies to publish their GI in the intranet, allowing users to have access to the data. This is expected to relieve the burden and cost of producing the geospatial data themselves. Eventually analysis of the data can be carried out.

The pilot for NaLIS is currently in progress in the Federal Territory, involving seven Government agencies. This year, the development of NaLIS will be focused in Sabah. Nik Mohd Zain points out that the Ministry is also looking to provide underground infrastructure information such as piping after the first phase of NaLIS has been implemented across the country.

CAMS Upgrade
Besides the computerisation of land information, the Surveying and Mapping Department (JUPEM), under the Ministry, would also have completed the second phase upgrade of the computer assisted mapping system (CAMS) at the end of this month.

Consuming an investment of RM15 million, the upgrade covers the supply, delivery, installation, testing and commisioning of a map publishing system from Barco, photogrammetry system from LH Systems, and storage and disaster recovery system.

The upgrade contract was awarded to New Technology and Innovation Sdn Bhd (NTI). The company's chief executive officer, Jamaluddin Ismail, says that the company has not signed the three years maintenance contract for this upgrade phase, but the company has been maintaining the first phase project for the past years.

The maintenance contract will usually amount to 10 per cent of the actual value of the contract.

With this upgrade, JUPEM will be able to speed up the map production and diversify its product range to include production of orthophoto maps which is expected to be in great demand.

Digital Map
Currently, digital maps have been developed for 80 per cent of Peninsular Malaysia. The remaining 20 per cent are expected to be completed by year-end. This year too, the focus for digital mapping will be on Sabah and Sarawak where the progress has been slow moving.

According to Nik Mohd Zain, Labuan Territory has been completed and digital mapping for 29 valleys in Sabah and Sarawak was outsourced last year. The country is expected to be covered fully by year 2005.

Besides enabling maps to be sold via the Internet, another usage of the digitised map is for mobile positioning systems which have been much talked about by mobile device providers.

So far, a few telecommunications companies have enquired about the digital maps such as Binafon, and talks have been ongoing to use the data for mobile devices.

FMS
Another project that has been undertaken by the Ministry, together with the Ministry of Defence, is the fast mapping system (FMS). This project is expected to consume an investment of RM40 million when completed.

According to Nik Mohd Zain, the FMS software is from Canada and is used for military purposes. The data from this system will be able to provide a satellite image map of digital terrain information, such as the height from the ground when airplanes are flying. This is said to be suitable for military training purposes.