Artificial intelligence: Surveyors are equipping themselves with a new framework to support the transformation of the profession

The Order of Surveyors announced the launch of two major initiatives at the end of the event: the adoption of a Charter for the use of artificial intelligence in professional practice and the launch of the first ordinal AI assistant.

A profession already largely engaged and mature in the face of AI

“This theme was overwhelmingly chosen by our colleagues during a national consultation. We knew there was a very strong expectation from them.” recalls Luc Lanoy, General Rapporteur of the Congress.

Far from being an emerging topic for the profession, AI is already part of the daily routine for many firms. A survey conducted with each regional council shows that 99% of respondents are familiar with AI and that nearly three-quarters of firms (74%) have already begun using or experimenting with it. While the majority of uses involve saving time on administrative and document-related tasks (54%), a third of firms are starting to integrate it on an ad-hoc basis into their core technical business, particularly for geospatial processing, LiDAR, or photogrammetry. While experimentation is the norm, strategic integration remains incomplete: training teams and structuring practices are therefore the challenges for the profession in the future.

A groundbreaking Charter to guide and accelerate innovation in the profession

To support this development without hindering innovation, the Order has unveiled a Charter for the use of artificial intelligence in professional practice. This binding document applies to all land surveyors and their staff.

Based on the principle of human primacy, this regulation imposes a threefold requirement of transparency, traceability, and accountability. The land surveyor must therefore inform clients and other relevant third parties in advance of any significant use of an AI system in the performance of their services. They must also ensure traceability proportionate to the nature of the work carried out with the aid of an AI system in order to provide clear and precise explanations to stakeholders. In other words, they must be able to indicate where and how they used AI during the course of their work. Finally, they commit to ensuring that the final validation is always carried out by a human.

“Responsibility cannot be delegated to an algorithm; this is fundamental. Our approach is unprecedented within a regulated profession in France.” Luc Lanoy supports this.

The Charter also provides for a continuing education obligation in order to develop and maintain the skills of land surveyors and their staff on the subject.

For Luc Lanoy: "These training programs will also help promote the responsible use of AI, in terms of sovereignty and environmental impact."

Finally, Séverine Vernet, the president of the High Council of the Order of Surveyors, returned to the lineage of the Charter, which sets a clear and responsible framework in accordance with the GDPR and the European AI Act regulation.

For Séverine Vernet: "The Europe of tomorrow is also the Europe of regulation, and I believe that this Charter illustrates the role of professional bodies: to concretely extend the major European frameworks through sectoral regulation which, in an increasingly complex world, organizes, protects and maintains trust."

This observation was shared and welcomed by both MEP Valérie Hayer and Senator Laurence Garnier, who were present for the occasion.

RAG AI: the first secure virtual ordinal assistant

Alongside the Charter, the Order announced the operational launch, starting this fall, of an AI-powered Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) tool. This is the Order's very first AI assistant. This tool will provide each land surveyor with efficient, seamless, and secure access to the profession's entire documentary heritage via the Order's extranet. Thanks to this innovation, professionals will be able to search legislative texts, Order directives, legal doctrine, case law, as well as methodological guides and professional standards in a targeted manner.

In a context of profound technological acceleration which is redefining societal expectations, the professional body is thus demonstrating that it is fully assuming its role as a regulatory authority.

“By anticipating these changes and establishing a framework of trust, we are accelerating innovation in the profession. At the end of this congress, I believe that our true wealth no longer lies solely in our ability to generate data, but in our capacity to qualify it and guarantee its reliability. This is the crux of the Order's positioning: if artificial intelligence produces information, the land surveyor, for their part, produces trust.” concluded Séverine Vernet.