Orienteers rightly expect high standards of event organisation, course planning and controlling at competitions. They also expect to get accurate maps. Generally speaking the event officials and mappers try their best and strive to improve standards, innovating and pushing out the borders of what is achievable.
A by-product of this is the trend towards professionally produced maps. Time was when a dedicated mapper or two would spend months surveying an area and drawing the map. If it was a new area it might even be for a regional or national championships. The care and dedication which went into the overall project would be reflected in the quality of the finished product: meticulous craftsmanship, attention to detail, checking and re-checking to produce a work of art and of science. A well-drawn map, it was reasonable to assume, was a well-surveyed and an accurate map, one which the competitor could rely on (or, put another way, a carelessly drawn map immediately rang alarm bells in the competitor's mind to expect not too much from the survey either).
Computerised mapping has changed all that. Even a sketchy survey can be transformed into a beautifully drawn map by using OCAD or another drawing program. No alarm bells ring in the orienteer's mind when presented with a map like this: only out on the course, when things don't seem to fit, does the realisation come that all is not as it seems - the map may look fine but the survey is bad. How can mapping awards be given if the presentation of the map is all that is taken into account, if all maps are produced to a uniformly high standard of appearance? (This is a general point - it in no way reflects on the areas chosen for awards at the recent IOA AGM).
Another point which arises from the increased use of professional mappers, even for lower grade areas, is the progressive loss of the skills of mapping. Orienteering is a house with many rooms: you might find that you are really an organiser, a competitor, a planner, a mapper or whatever. If more and more maps are being produced professionally, where are the new mappers going to learn the trade? How will they cut their teeth?
Perhaps the reluctance of new mappers to get involved stems from the increasing selfishness of people towards their own free time, perhaps from fear of criticism or failure, but we should be encouraging them to get involved. We should be running mapping courses to raise standards and giving the mapping effort every help. It's incredible that the IOA hasn't had a mapping officer for the past year or more.
Maps and juniors are the future of the sport - we have to encourage them both if orienteering is to survive at all, let alone prosper.