The thousands of Australian organisations who rely on Census data will have greater access to cutting-edge geographic visualisation and analysis tools after the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) and the nation’s leading Geographic Information System (GIS) specialist Esri Australia came to an historic agreement.

The three year Enterprise Licensing Agreement (ELA) will assist the ABS in improving service delivery of its Census material by leveraging Esri Australia’s world-leading mapping software, data, web services and documentation.

The timing of the agreement was driven by yesterday’s official ABS release of the first round of 2011 Census results. Covering around nine million households, last year’s Census was Australia’s largest to date.

Esri Australia Business Manager Craig Sandy said the agreement will allow business, government and not-for-profit organisations to better access, identify and interpret community demographics than ever before.

“GIS technology literally maps the geographic elements in information and exposes patterns and relationships that may otherwise be hidden in a maze of numeric tables,” Mr Sandy said.

“This landmark ELA will combine the world’s best GIS technology with Australia’s primary and most authoritative source of demographic data.

“It will enable individuals and organisations in the public and private sectors to make more informed decisions on operational, policy and planning issues that impact on the lives of all Australians.

“Businesses will be able to better target customers, governments will have greater insight into school, hospital and roads funding provision, and community service organisations will be able to more accurately identify areas most in need.”

The ELA gives the ABS unlimited access to Esri Australia licences, enabling the nation’s statistical body to use the technology to reach as many individuals and organisations as needed.

Mr Sandy commended ABS on ensuring GIS technology would become a core component of Census data delivery.

“Organisations and, in particular, businesses world-wide are recognising the immense value this technology has in information analysis and decision-making,” Mr Sandy said.

“Australian businesses can now take advantage of the huge benefits of having GIS technology incorporated into and driving their use of Census data.”