News

Maps for Farm Management

Maps have always played an important role in farm management. Now with technolo­gies like geographic information systems (GIS) the maps are digital and that, says, Eagle Technology' Lauren McArtney, means they can do much more with them.

Unlike paper maps, GIS maps are living documents. Farmers can update them in an instant and share them with key stakeholders such as suppliers, government or customers. They represent the real world as a series of spatial layers. These layers represent the location of key as­sets, the distribution of soil types, farm activities or crop health. Armed with digital maps farmers can manage the various aspects of the farm in a dynamic and connected way including bringing in live data feeds from sensors or third party data-feeds.   

McArtney says GIS is an important way to support health and safety processes on a farm. She says: "Making a farm safe is about understanding hazards, visualising them and sharing that information in an easy to understand map for any visitors or contractors. Incidents or fresh risks can easily be recorded when and where they occur and used to act as well as for reporting. This means recording health and safety isn't a separate task, and it becomes part of a farm's everyday workflow.   

Scott Campbell, Eagle Technology's Head of GIS technology says farmers have, for a while, been capturing drone and satellite imagery and internet-of-things (IoT) sensors and these too have a location associated with them and are being incorporated within a farm's GIS.   

Campbell says "These data sources, as well as being more dynamic, can give access to valuable layers of data (for example productivity, water quality, soil moisture or weather conditions) which can be connected to other layers providing a more complete picture such as continuous temperature, water quality, crop productivity and understand how these affect one another: this takes advantage of the basic value of GIS which is connecting things through a shared location."

Farmers have used drones for some time. Campbell says a drone can capture video footage that can become a two or three-dimensional image-based farm map.

He says: "Increasingly farmers make maps using information the infrared and ultravio­let areas beyond the visible spectrum. This allows them to pick up information about things such as vegetation health."

ArcGIS provides the farmer with tools and maps that help decision making and in turn, makes for greater productivity, less waste and better sustain­ability.

More information:
Eagle Technology Agribusiness Lead: Murray McCallum
E: mrm@eagle.co.nz
M: 021 763 044
www.eagle.co.nz/agtech

Register for the Eagle Technology Agtech webinar: https://bit.ly/3fHwXN1

COVID-19 - Eagle Technology Business Continuity

UPDATE 30 March 2020 - Accessing your ArcGIS Licenses working from the Home Office

As the situation surrounding COVID-19 continues to evolve, Eagle Technology is committed to keeping its people safe and is following guidelines from the Ministry of Health. We have now activated our business continuity plan so that we can continue to support all our customers. This means that the majority of our staff will be working remotely, leveraging the necessary technology to continue business as usual.

What will this mean for you? You will still be able to contact all staff whilst accessing the services and support you need. Communications will move to a virtual-first approach which includes meetings, events, and training where, for example, all instructor-led courses will now be delivered online until further notice.

For users of Esri software and services, Esri has released the following statement, with Eagle Technology's support:
Esri is fully prepared to maintain operations during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We have not experienced any significant business impact or interruption. We have a business continuity plan in place across all business units, including technology support and customer service, to ensure resilience. We will continue to fully serve our users, partners, and employees without disruption.

Additionally, we wanted to highlight the following resources currently available for you to access and use:

Esri COVID-19 GIS Hub – this hub provides a collection of authoritative global datasets, reporting dashboards and other useful content. This includes access to ArcGIS Online with ArcGIS Hub Basic as well as the ArcGIS Hub Coronavirus Response template.

Request for Eagle Assistance – locally, Eagle's Emergency Support Programme is available for requests for assistance related to such emergency events as COVID-19. Our team work with Esri's Disaster Response Programme team to support you in times of need.

Alongside these, our dedicated support lines continue to remain open:

General: https://www.eagle.co.nz/it-services/support

GIS specific: https://www.eagle.co.nz/gis-solutions/gis-support

Eagle Technology will continue to keep you informed of any changes to these arrangements and appreciate your flexibility and support during this unprecedented situation we are facing.

Please stay healthy and take care of one another and your families.

Regards,

Duane Eagle
Managing Director
Eagle Technology

Vector Basemaps in NZTM

To complement our existing raster Basemaps, the content team is working hard on the next generation of Basemaps in the New Zealand Transverse Mercator projection: vector Basemaps. These Basemaps are cached and delivered as vector tiles and are rendered client-side based on a style file that is delivered with the vector tiles. 

The content team has released the second beta of the NZ Topographic Map and will be fully releasing that map soon. You can find the layer and map in this group (be sure to join this group as we will be adding the final releases and new beta styles to this group). The NZ Topographic Map is based on the World Topographic map from Esri. After the NZ Topographic Map, we plan on releasing more styles as vector Basemaps like the Canvas maps, Navigation map and a hybrid style that can be overlaid with the NZ Imagery Basemap. 

Please keep an eye out on our blog post where we will be adding more information shortly more information about the new Vector Basemaps and how you can style them and add them to your Basemap gallery.

Waikato Open Data LAUNCH and Information Session

Eagle Technology Group Ltd opens Christchurch office

AUCKLAND – 6^th March 2018 –

Eagle Technology Group Ltd has opened an office in Christchurch to support its South Island client base. Located in the central city, the office makes real the ‘virtual’ office that has been run by Kenna Kelly, principal Account Manager for Eagle’s South Island customers, since the earthquake of February 2011. Joining Kenna is a full service team offering Professional Services and Technical Support.

Duane Eagle, Managing Director, Eagle Technology, says the office is the culmination of a plan that began more than seven years ago. “We first opened our Christchurch office in January 2011 in Victoria Street, an area that suffered extensive damage just one month later, and necessitated Kenna’s move to her home as a base, supported remotely by the wider team out of Wellington and Auckland. During this time our South Island customers have grown to include more than 150 organisations across sectors including Local Government, Infrastructure, Agriculture, Utilities, Education, Iwi, Consulting and Business.”

“We have a number of very long-standing customers, particularly in local and regional government , as well as a burgeoning number in other sectors, such as Forestry and Infrastructure. As a full-service IT infrastructure and GIS practice, we’ve provided GIS solutions to solve a number of problems relating to the Christchurch re-build, and have been active in assisting with Common Operating systems for Emergency Management teams in more recent events, such as the Port Hills fires and the Kaikoura earthquakes. So it’s very exciting after a seven year hiatus, to have a permanent, accessible local base for our team and our customers.”

Eagle Technology is the distributor for Esri’s ArcGIS platform, and will also now be offering instructor led training courses in Christchurch as part of the regular training schedule.

Christchurch Office Location:
Eagle Technology, Billens Building, Suite 7, Level 1, 177 High St, Christchurch, 8011
Postal:
Eagle Technology, PO Box 22656, CBD, Christchurch, 8140

29 November 2017

Duane Eagle steps into Leadership Role

The Board of Eagle Technology wishes to advise the resignation of Mark Allan, CEO, effective today. The Board acknowledges the considerable contribution Mark has given to Eagle Technology through the past eight months as Eagle has effected change and growth as a full-service Geospatial, Communications and Managed Services provider.

“Mark has been instrumental in identifying key markets and managing internal processes to meet demand as our business continues to grow. He leaves Eagle to pursue personal and other business interests,” says Duane Eagle, Executive Director, Eagle Technology.

The Board wishes to announce that Duane Eagle will assume Mark’s responsibilities, stepping into the leadership role for the family owned business that was established by his late father Trevor Eagle and his mother, Corallie Eagle, forty-eight years ago.

Duane Eagle has worked in the business for twenty-seven years, initially in Sales, as Business Development Manager and in his current role for the past five years. 

NZ Esri Young Scholar

The Esri Young Scholar Award is about recognising the very best GIS students around the globe. Every year, Esri's global partners nominate 25 university students for excellence in relation to a GIS project. These projects include comprehensive research papers, software development, impactful maps, and apps that promote education, conservation, disaster response, and urban planning.

NZ Esri Young Scholar Award 2017 – Winner

Eagle Technology is pleased to announce Leigh McKenzie of the University of Otago as the Winner of the NZ Esri Young Scholar Award 2017.

To recognise this achievement, Leigh will be attending the Esri Education Conference and Esri User Conference in San Diego in July 2017. 

Leigh’s project entitled Using a Geodatabase to Assess Vulnerability to Sea Level Rise in Greater South Dunedin focused on a subject that potentially has serious repercussions for many low lying areas of New Zealand. ArcGIS was utilised in her project to provide further understanding about what could go on in South Dunedin as sea levels rise.

For more details on Leigh’s project view her poster at:

Using a Geodatabase to Assess Vulnerability to Sea Level Rise in Greater South Dunedin

The entries this year were really exceptional and Eagle Technology commends the following outstanding projects for the NZ Esri Young Scholar Award 2017.

• Euan Forsyth for his Walking to scale: Utilising ArcGIS to implement a residential scale walkability index in Auckland project and
• Stephen Ford for his Lightning Strike Prediction – Protecting Critical Assets project.

Eagle Technology is a stakeholder and supporter of Predator Free NZ (PFNZ) a charitable trust formed to connect, inform and inspire others to get involved in the cause to protect New Zealand’s endangered native species by eliminating the threat of introduced predators such as possums, stoats and rats.

Eagle brings its strong expertise with geospatial data and technology to map and analyse the predator management work being done across the country. To do this Eagle has been collaborating with organisations such as OSPRI, Department of Conservation, Nga Whenua Rahui, and regional councils to create a ‘Big Picture’ map of New Zealand showing where the gaps and opportunities lie, thus allowing the many organisations across NZ to focus their resources where and how they can be most effective.

An example of this mapping can be seen on the PFNZ website (http://predatorfreenz.org/the-big-picture/) as well as in a dedicated map viewer (http://pfnz.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Viewer/index.html?appid=00e67ff4ce7347b5976d7142b3dcc227).

As a key part of this support, Eagle’s Chief Executive Gary Langford is also a Trustee and member of the PFNZ Board helping to steer the organisation. Below is the press release from Predatro Free New Zealand.

Bold Plan to make New Zealand predator free

A group of New Zealanders and independent businesses are joining forces with government agencies to create a predator free New Zealand – eradicating all rats, possums and stoats and other predators to native bird life and conservation.

The group formed the Predator Free New Zealand Trust, which will receive $575,000 over the next two years from the Community Conservation Partnerships Fund.

The Trust unveiled the first stage of its vision at the ‘A Place to Live’ conference in Whanganui today. It revealed a map displaying predator control areas already undertaken by public and government agencies including OSPRI, DOC and regional councils.

Stage two of the Trust’s work focuses on community and private efforts, which are underway or planned.

Chairman of Predator Free New Zealand Devon McLean said the secret weapon in this battle was the countless number of New Zealanders, mainly volunteers, already dedicating millions of hours controlling the predators.

However, he said, becoming predator free would not be an easy task and would require new innovation and real commitment from all New Zealanders.

“We believe the only way that New Zealand can be predator free is if all Kiwis, in every community, in every region, accept some of the responsibility and join in the fight.”

Gareth Morgan was one of the business leaders supporting the Trust. Eliminating predators was important to secure a future for our threatened native species, including our national emblem the kiwi, Dr Morgan said.

It was also a boost to our vital tourism industry, reduced diseases and increased farm output resulting in gains for our food exports and an enhanced international reputation.

The vision of a predator-free New Zealand is the brainchild of eminent physician Sir Paul Callaghan, a native of Whanganui. At his last public lecture in 2011, Sir Paul likened the vision to the first Apollo mission, saying “It’s crazy, it’s ambitious but I think it might be worth a shot”.

Trustee Professor Charles Daugherty, of Victoria University, said the Trust was a necessary investment to protect our biodiversity for future generations and secure what we most treasure about being New Zealanders.

Contact Nicky Barton 0273060603 or 04 499 6940