The participation of each partner is formalised by means of an agreement. The agreement and its structure are standardised. The parties pay an annual fee in order to assist with financing basic data sets, and agree to share their own data in the infrastructure by adopting a common technical framework and use of some common standards.
The Ministry of Local Government and Modernisation recommends and mandates the Norway Digital organisation to act as the national agency for coordination of actions intended to encourage responsible public agencies to fulfil requirements defined in the Norwegian Geodata Act (2010) and underlying regulations.
Who can become a partner in the Norwegian NSDI organisation?
Public agencies can apply to become partner organisations. Partnership is regulated by rules defined by the Norwegian Ministry of Local Government and Modernisation.
User rights and data licences
The parties have a mutual right to use one another’s data. All environmental data is free of charge anyway, and is distributed via open data licences. In practice, therefore, the Norway Digital agreement gives its partners the right to access and use different kinds of detailed reference data, with specific licence agreements and access keys. There are separate rules for cadastral data due to a governmental regulation.
Public agencies can further assign their rights and data to private companies for a limited time if the private company – an IT consultancy firm, for instance – is working on behalf of the public agency.
Private value-adding organisations have access to all open data under open data licences. Data under other licences, e.g. detailed technical maps, detailed ortophotos and geodetic services, can be utilised through separate commercial user agreements.
Norway Digital agreements give partners the right to access and use the following data
- Detailed large-scale technical and spatial data (FKB data)
- Aerial photos (ortophotos) and satellite images
- Cadastral information and building information (matrikkelen)
- Positioning web services (CPOS and DPOS)
- Land use master plans and detailed zoning plans from municipalities
Agreement forms
The Norway Digital agreement is divided into three parts/three documents
- Main agreement
- General rules for Norway Digital organisations
- Appendix 1: Partner cost – based on a calculation form
- Appendix 2: Partner deliverables – data and services
- Appendix 3: Additional partner-specific regulations