FIG International Congress 2010 It was my first time participating in a FIG event in its Congress 2010 held in Sydney between 11 and 16 April 2010. Apart from the 10 delegates of the HKIS, we have opportunity to meet many other surveyors from Hong Kong and made friends with surveyors from other countries of the world. Amazingly, there were a total of three big Plenary Sessions and close to 150 concurrent technical sessions summing up to about 680 paper presentations. Speakers were grouped according to their area of research and corresponding to respective Commission Panels. Obviously, Commission 8 (Spatial Planning and Development) and 9 (Valuation and the Management of Real Estate) are the most relevant divisions to property and facility management surveying. The terms of reference for Commission 8 set out as "Regional and local structure planning; urban and rural land use planning and implementation; planning policies and environmental management for sustainable development; re-engineering of mega cities; public-private partnerships; informal settlement issues in spatial development, planning and governance" whereas for Commission 9 as "Valuation; investment in real estate and investment planning; real estate investment vehicles; real estate, development finance and land use feasibility planning; real estate economics and markets and market analyses; management of property and property systems; management of public sector property." The speakers such grouped in Commission 8 and 9 provided a prime focus for debate. I attended several sessions in areas of Environment, Energy, Deformation Measurement, Climate Change, Spatial Enabled Society, Sustainable Development, Heritage Planning and Disaster Management. Having taken the opportunity as arranged by the organizer, I attended two visits including the Office of Planning Department of New South Wales (NSW) and the Sydney Emergency Operations Centre. With the kind arrangement of the Planning Department, I shared the experience of a management team for a nearby 5-star green building: the Deutche Bank Plaza. Share of Interesting Sessions I would like to share with members abstracts of two interested presentations which I attended. Kate Fairlie of Australia presented a paper on "Representing Carbon Property Rights". It was emphasized that reduction of carbon emissions is considered crucial in the mitigation of a global rise in temperature and severe climate change. Many countries of the world had efficiently reduced national carbon emissions and fulfil Kyoto Protocol obligations, and emergent sequestration rights in carbon. In this respect, rights in carbon follow rights in water and biota as emerging property rights that should be separately managed, me asured and represen ted visually. In addressing the impact of carbon emissions, our land and property shall be managed holistically with an adequate representation of the relationships and interdependencies between various land elements, rights, obligations and consequences, and the numerous stakeholders with an interest. Malvern Tipping of United Kingdom presented a paper on heritage reservation named as "Identifying Clay-construction Buildings in a Norfolk Market Town". Through a combination of a lack of identification and a lack of understanding on the part of both built environment professionals and builders, valuable heritage used to be irretrievably destroyed, such as those buildings built from timber frame with “wattle and daub panels” and those built from clay-lump. Hence, there is a need for historic clay buildings to be identified and recorded. Once identified, both built environment professionals and builders need to of such buildings and the dissemination of skills and knowledge. Collected data by a small professional team were entered into a database used by local authorities and others. Knowledge was also disseminated to both property professionals and builders. The exercise provides a template for the collection and recording of data with respect to historic clay buildings in other town throughout East Anglia. Share of Visits The Office of NSW Planning Department was located inside the old Lands Department Building, Bridge Street of Sydney. The building, which was designed by the then Colonial Architect, James Barnet, in around 1876 with an Italian Renaissance style, has now been classified by the National Trust of Australia as being essential to the heritage of Australia. The classification lists the building as one that must be preserved. During the visit, the Planning department’s Director introduced the e-Planning System which was an initiative of NSW Local Government strategic direction for IT investment. As many other Councils seek similar service, it is possibly a future statewide approach. The purpose of e-Planning is to ensure NSW is competitive and attractive to business and investment, to cut assessment times and costs, and to simplify the current complex planning system which is slow and difficult to navigate. The initial stage of e-Planning comprises "Spatial Information Exchange (SIX) Planning Channel", "BASIX", "LDPM", "e-Planning Roadmap" and "Electronic Housing Code Pilot". While browsing the SIX planning channel, viewer may access information of a piece of land such as cadastre, topographic data, Local Environmental Plans, State Environmental Planning Policies, Regional Environmental Plans, State Heritage Register Items and Local Planning Directions, e.g. acid sulphate soil, etc. The Department may also deliver planning data online to ultimate users. BASIX stands for Building Sustainability 10 million tones of CO2 emissions a year by 2020. LDPM denotes Local Development Performance Monitoring which is an extranet site allowing councils to submit performance monitoring data and to provide links to useful reports. E-Planning Roadmap is a 10-year vision for e-Planning which aims to identify planning functions that can be improved by technology resulting priority projects for implementation after consultation with stakeholders. Electronic Housing Code Pilot focused on the development of online systems for the pre-lodgement, lodgement and processing of complying development applications under the NSW housing code. The Sydney Emergency Operation Centre (SEOC) is located inside the NSW Rural Fire Service Headquarters at Carter Street. It is a state level emergency centre structured under the management of Rural Fire Service section, one of the five emergency organizations of NSW including fire service, ambulance service and police. Emergency call is normally handled by an emergency hotline of an adjoining 24-hour Call Centre and the SEOC can immediately be mobilized within half an hour to takeover control of a major incident, such as a widespread bush fire, which this SEOC was normally dealt with. Once being activated, the SEOC will continuously cause public awareness by means of warning and update the public the situation of a fire scene through media. That’s why there is a media and broadcasting room behind the SEOC. The SEOC can also provide emergency alert to public through internet and mobile phone. It also supports other agencies in emergency situation such as flood, storm and rescue situation. The SEOC is able to connect aviation and gather information on weather forecasts and its likely effect on fire, fire status and possible resources readily available as support and priorities of allocation. This information helps to ensure the right level of support is provided in time, and fire and other incidents are controlled at a local level with minimum level of damages.