What is GIS? How does it work?

For over 20 years, Certes has been providing its clients in Western Canada information management and geographic information system (GIS) services backed by a team of four trained individuals with a combined experience of over 60 years in spatial management. 

In simple terms, GIS  gathers, manages, and analyzes spatial and, of course, geographic data. A GIS data management system takes information related to the Earth’s surface and captures, stores, checks, and displays that information concerning those positions. It can also help experts in studying climate change, land use planning and business. In other words, GIS data on a map can show streets, buildings, and vegetation.

On that note, common uses of GIS range from inventory and management of resources, Traditional Land Use mapping, forming and monitoring routes, managing networks and properties to finding and targeting customers, locating properties that coincides with a specific set of criteria and managing agricultural crop data.

Other types of projects GIS data management can be used for when it comes to business purposes or daily life includes accident analysis, urban and transportation planning, analyzing the environmental impact, disaster management mitigation, navigation, flood damage estimation banking and taxation.

Additionally, GIS data Analysis has a wide range of uses in problem-solving and decision making as well as the visualization of data in a spatial environment.  GIS problem solving includes environmental issues like a flood, landslide, soil erosions, drought, and earthquakes, while also tackling issues such as climate change, habitat loss, population growth and pollution. GIS data management can also be effective in wastewater management, oil spills and sewage treatment.

With its wide range of uses, it is evident that GIS data management certainly comes with its benefits. GIS services can help businesses make better decisions, improve function and performance, boost customer service and sales, and provides more efficiency to the overall community.

Here at Certes, we have implemented a ‘best of breed’ approach in regards to the tools we use in our areas of expertise.  Our experience extends to ESRI, QGIS, Autodesk and other industry leading products. We are always seeking out the most up-to-date technologies so we can provide GIS functionality to all our clients or the public through web mapping and web GIS.

Our focus on GIS is to collect, store, analyze, manage, and present geographically linked data. By doing so, we can effectively pinpoint strengths, challenges, and gaps as it relates to the current state of each dataset and provides spatially linked solutions. 

Key GIS data management services Certes provide are: 

Certes has recently completed a range of GIS projects, including the geospatial prediction of landslides in British Columbia and GIS data management services for the Matsqui First Nation.

To learn more about GIS data services and how Certes can help you, contact us today.