According to a new report from the Geospatial Commission, a new Land Use Analysis Taskforce should be set up, in order to support decision making concerning the use of land in the UK.
The Finding Common Ground Report has issued a recommendation that the taskforce should support government policies through cutting edge data analysis. This would see the taskforce assessing the potential to ‘reconcile competing demands’ in how UK land is used in order to meet nationwide priorities. These include infrastructure, housing, agriculture, and the environment.
The four recommendations that have come from the report are:
- Establish a Land Use Analysis Taskforce to bring together cutting-edge data and scientific expertise to assess competing land use pressures, ensuring national priorities are delivered within the land available in the UK.
- Champion market innovations that help visualise and deliver how we can achieve better land use decisions.
- Strengthen the linked between land use policy design, academic research and industry practice.
- Develop a standard approach to classifying key land use data to improve how we can link data about land.
Viscount Camrose, Minister for AI and Intellectual Property at the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, said:
“Land is so fundamental for how we live our lives – it produces the food we eat, supports ecosystems that we rely on for clean air and fresh water, and provides the space for us all to live and work in. As we face new economic and environmental pressures, we need to make smart choices to get the best from our land.
“We should capitalise on advances in data science and modelling technologies to help us bring together data from a range of sources, and present it accessibly, in order to support better use of land.”
The Geospatial Commission believes that improved use of land is a key driver of the nation’s ambitions in delivering economic growth and fairly distributing opportunities across the entire country. This will also have to be done whilst meeting the demands of a growing population. The report from the commission outlines how data can be used in a better way to drive growth whilst helping to protect the environment, adapting to climate change, and achieving the national net zero goals.
