82nd MIG-T meeting 2025-06-27

Action 1.1. Towards a digital ecosystem for environment and sustainability

• FAIR data in INSPIRE 
  
  • ISO & GeoDCAT-AP metadata implementation pilot - status update
    • The results of the ISO and GeoDCAT-AP metadata implementation pilot obtained from October 2024 to June 2025 (first phase of the pilot) were shared. The pilot proved to be an excellent collaborative effort in which the INSPIRE community has been actively involved.
    • Most of the objectives identified at the beginning of the pilot have been achieved, although some work is still pending to finish the evaluation of the quality of the metadata transformation, the quantification of potential information losses, and the degree of compliance of the transformed geospatial metadata to the provisions of the INSPIRE Directive and the High-Value Datasets (HVDs) Implementing Regulation.
    • A summary of the main pilot achievents was presented, including: (a) the High-Value Datasets tagging good practice (non-multilingual example / multilingual example); (b) the latest version available of the Issue-summary spreadsheet (covering all issues identified and discussed during the first phase of the pilot); and (c) the final version of the Pilot Final report (including expectations, previous experiences, testing approach and results from each participant, and the global results such as the Issue-summary spreadsheet and the general conclusions of this activity). Details on these conclusions were shared with the MIG-T.
    • Based on these outcomes, the objectives for the continuation of the pilot (phase 2) and other activities to support the reporting of geospatial HVDs were shared with the audience. They could be focused on four areas: (a) Efficient support to geospatial HVD harvesting and reporting; (b) Guidelines for HVD reporting for the geospatial community; (c) Alignment of INSPIRE to Open Data flows under the GreenData4All; and (d) Research on the potential use of AI-powered metadata tools.
    • The outcomes of the pilot will be consolidated until 04 Jul 2025. A meeting between the relevant EU-level services (mainly the SEMIC Group of DIGIT, the OP, and the JRC) will take place in mid-July to agree on the activities to support HVD reporting until the next HVD reporting deadline, due in February 2027. It will be used to assign responsibilities and resources, and coordinate the activities of these services.
    • News on the final plan of activities will be shared with the MS by September 2025. And update of the GeoDCAT-AP XSLT transformation will be possibly targeted by December 2025.

• MS to consider the nomination of representatives for the second phase of the ISO & GeoDCAT-AP metadata implementation pilot.

• • Geospatial HVDs tagging good practice candidate
    • The good practice on geospatial HVDs tagging was shortly presented after presenting all the outcomes from the ISO and GeoDCAT-AP metadata implementation pilot.
    • After that, it was proposed to the MIG-T for endorsement. All Member States / Countries voted in favour with no objections.
    • Next steps according the INSPIRE Good Practice procedure will be announced soon.

• MIG-T to endorse the Geospatial HVDs tagging good practice. 
• JRC to communicate the next steps of the process, according to the INSPIRE Good Practice procedure.
  

• • JRC study: AI-augmented metadata lifecycle

    • The JRC presentated the research topic for developing an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered metadata editor for geospatial data, which could help simplifying certain metadata management technical activities (e.g. data-service linking simplification, geo-HVD tagging good practice, metadata encoding changes, finetuning of codelists, language-related transformations), to be included in the continuation of the ISO & GeoDCAT-AP pilot.

    • MIG-T representatives were invited to provide feedback and joining this effort.

• Interested MIG-T representatives to provide feedback on the proposal and to consider joining this effort e.g. providing metadata samples and/or data documentation as input for this work. 

• Good practices status update
  • STAC candidate good practice
    • The SpatioTemporal Asset Catalogs (STAC) specification was presented by SE for potential consideration as an INSPIRE good practice for download service, for its excellent support for accessing and downloading predefined datasets (bulk download). STAC has an associated API and already features a wide user support in the GIS ecosystem, see e.g. QGIS and ArcGIS built-in support. This evidence of implementation makes it a good candidate for an INSPIRE good practice.

• JRC to call for an ad-hoc meeting in autumn 2025. 
  
• MIG-T to nominate representatives to investigate STAC as a potential INSPIRE good practice. 

Action 2.4. Governance of artefacts

• Open actions on GitHub:
  • TG issue #172 proposing deprecation of WMS 1.1.1 in the View Services TG was not brought forward due to little feedback received from MIG-T members, and was closed.
• The second release of the year of the INSPIRE artefacts will happen on 31 Jul 2025.
  • Technical Guidelines (TG) / Application Schemas / UML models: There will be no release for these artefacts since the only TG change proposal for voting in this meeting has an impact on IR and should thus follow a longer procedure:
    •  Issue #199 - proposing to add a new 'Pumping station' Feature type in the Annex I Hydrography – Hydro – Physical Waters application schema.
  • INSPIRE Registry content: the following change proposals were presented and proposed to be included as part of the v.2025.2 release:
    
    • Issue #109 - proposing to correct the Application Schema property linked to the FormOfRoadNodeValue codelist.
    • Issue #114 - proposing to change the URI (external reference link) for the OGC API-Features value of the ProtocolValue metadata codelist.
• The MIG-T unanimously voted in favour of endorsing the three changes proposals referred above (see poll results).

Action 2.4 Central INSPIRE Components

• Reference Validator
  • As per the release plan, the next release of the Validator v.2025.1 will happen on 09 Jul 2025. This will be the only release planned in 2025 and will include both breaking and non-breaking changes. In terms of new functionalities, the release will include a new Conformance Class aimed to facilitate testing of the declaration of conformance in network service metadata against the Implementing Rules for network services (Regulation 976/2009) (see the corresponding ATS and ETS).
  • The Amazon API Gateway, which was limiting the usage of the Validator API, was removed. An alternative solution with comparable effects was put in place to limit the use of the API (see GitHub discussion).
  • Helpdesk issues are addressed based on a prioritisation approach.

• Re3gistry software

Updates from the ESTAT GISCO team

• In alignment with its WP 2022-2025, the Geographic Information System of the Commission (GISCO) is continuing collecting (core) geospatial data. Examples are shown of the processes to create pan-European datasets for a set of core datasets, including Administrative Units, Buildings, Addresses, Orthoimagery, Population grids and Utility services. The increased availability of those datasets, favoured by the Implementing Act on high-value datasets, is evident.

Updates from the JRC

• Public consultation on the European Data union strategy: this is the data strategy of the European Commission 2024-2029, aimed at enhancing data availability and use (e.g. for the development of generative AI), streamlining existing data legislation & using data to reduce administrative burden, and developing an international data strategy to safeguard the export of EU data & stimulate import of data into the EU. A call for evidence was published, feedback can be provided until 18 Jul 2025.
• JRC Outlook report on Generative AI: the report provides a JRC 360° (technological, legal and societal) perspective on Generative AI. The report, accessible here, was officially launched in Brussels on 13 Jun 2025 with an intervention from Commissioner Zaharieva.

• The JRC shared the list of proposed actions captured throughout the meeting. MIG-T members agreed on the proposed list. 
  
• The 83rd MIG-T meeting will be organised online on 19 Sep 2025.