Donald Grant, AM
Professorial Fellow, Department of Geomatics
Biography
Don Grant was appointed as Surveyor-General of New South Wales in January 1986 and resigned from this position in late 2000. He is presently working as an international consultant in land administration. He is a Registered Surveyor and holds a Masters of Environmental Studies. In 1993 he was made a Professorial Associate in the Faculty of Science and Agriculture at Charles Sturt University, in May 1997 a Doctor of Applied Science, honoris causa at Charles Sturt University, a Doctor of Science, honoris causa at the University of New South Wales, an Adjunct Professor of the Department of Linguistics at the Macquarie University and in December 1997 a Professorial Fellow, Department of Geomatics, The University of Melbourne. In 1998 he was awarded the Mapping Sciences Institute, Australian Gold Medal and the AURISA Eminent Individual Award. He had earlier been appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia in the 1994 Queen's Honours List. Don was a Fellow of the Institution of Surveyors, Australia, a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, United Kingdom, a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, and is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. He is also the Australian representative of Commission 7 of the International Federation of Surveyors.
Don Grant is widely respected by both the profession and the community, earning an international reputation as a senior administrator and scholar. He has worked in most States of Australia, in the public and private sectors and the defence forces, serving in Australia and abroad. He has consulted or advised in the Sultanate of Brunei, the Bahamas, the Maritime Provinces of Canada, Poland, Greece, Sri Lanka, Hong Kong, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Pakistan, Zimbabwe and the Peoples Republic of China. As an Electoral Boundaries Commissioner he has been involved in both State and Federal Redistributions. Further, Don was instrumental in positioning the Surveyor-General's Department at the forefront of the global spatial information industry. Through his role as Chairman of the Public Sector Mapping Agencies, he has joined with all other jurisdictions in Australia to meet the national census mapping needs of the Australian Bureau of Statistics - a precursor to the creation of a National Spatial Data Infrastructure. As Foundation Chairman of the Australian Institute of Spatial Information Sciences and Technology (AISIST), Don directed training and consultancy services to a range of countries including Lao PDR, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, PR China, Malaysia, the Maldives and more recently Greece.