Free and unrestricted access to research results and publications, known as open access (OA), is key to speeding up scientific discovery. There is also growing evidence that OA maximises the impact of research through better dissemination and uptake of research findings.

But how can we make this a truly global and sustainable endeavour? This was much discussed at the recent Berlin 9 Open Access conference in Washington DC.

Unlock local research potential with open access

Leslie Chan

8 December 2011 | EN | 中文

The traditional journal publishing
system is not serving the needs
of developing countries

Flickr/moonlightbulb

The developing world is not well served by traditional research publishing, but can break new ground with open access, argues Leslie Chan.

Free and unrestricted access to research results and publications, known as open access (OA), is key to speeding up scientific discovery. There is also growing evidence that OA maximises the impact of research through better dissemination and uptake of research findings.

But how can we make this a truly global and sustainable endeavour? This was much discussed at the recent Berlin 9 Open Access conference in Washington DC.

There was a recurrent theme: that in today’s highly networked, open-knowledge environment, the traditional scholarly communication system — with the journal article as the key currency — can no longer serve the diverse needs of scholarship and discovery.

Conventional methods of evaluating research impact based on journal citations, particularly the reliance on Thomson Reuters’ journal impact factor, need to be reconsidered and redesigned to reflect new scholarly practices and the diverse means of engagement enabled by OA and the new wave of web tools (‘Web 2.0′).

OA offers an opportunity to rethink what constitutes research impact, how to reward scholarship and how to encourage research sharing — issues of particular importance for the developing world.

Emphasis on international appeal

For too long, research assessment in the developing world has closely followed practices and metrics created by wealthier nations. Even organisations such as UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) continue to reinforce the use of the journal impact factor and the registration of patents as metrics for national research performance.

As the impact factor is heavily biased towards journals from the developed world, researchers from poorer countries have been encouraged to publish in indexed international journals rather than national or local journals as a way to gain institutional and national recognition.

This has done much to shift the emphasis of research to topics that appeal to an international readership, obscuring local research agendas.

There is also a growing emphasis on university rankings as a proxy for excellence, based primarily on research productivity — prominent examples are Times Higher Education’s World University Rankings and the Academic Ranking of World Universities. This means that the impact factor continues to dominate research evaluation despite widespread criticism of biased coverage and a flawed methodology underlying its calculation.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in China, where researchers and institutions are given cash incentives to publish in high-ranking international journals. This is seen as essential for boosting China’s presence in world science.

So while the total scientific publication output from China, as measured by Thomson Reuters’ Web of Science, is now only second to the United States [1], the focus on external recognition undermines locally important research and creates disincentives for the government to focus on locally relevant policy and funding.

Openness can unlock potential

This should not be the model for the developing world to emulate. Instead,policymakers should encourage experimentation with practices that take advantage of the potential of openness — in research, data, source code, educational resources and innovation.

Open repositories for publications and data, new tools for knowledge discovery and new forms of representation and visualisation can bring exciting opportunities for innovations in scholarly communication. Examples are the Open Source Drug Discovery Network and the Virtual Open Access Agriculture and Aquaculture Repository.

We are seeing the emergence of what innovation-policy scholar Caroline Wagner calls the ‘new invisible college’ [2], where researchers collaborate across disciplinary and national boundaries, driven by common interests rather than by international funding agendas.

This is a good time for research institutions with nascent capacity to overtake those in well-off nations by adopting better mechanisms for the exchange of knowledge. And they may be better placed to adapt and innovate as they are not bound by tradition.

Signs to the open road

Policymakers and researchers must begin to take advantage of these capabilities. This means thinking beyond the confines of the impact factor and towards new forms of scholarly metrics enabled by social media andnetworking tools.

An encouraging development, announced at the Berlin 9 meeting, is the World Bank’s plan to provide open access to research it funds under a licence similar to that of Creative Commons — a clear sign that the organisation is beginning to see the links between openness and innovation.

Recently, UNESCO launched the Global Open Access Portal to mobilise and coordinate OA initiatives across its member states. This late arrival on the OA scene could duplicate existing efforts, but UNESCO’s action is significant and should spur other UN bodies into serious engagement with OA.

And next year’s Berlin 10 Open Access meeting will be hosted by the Stellenbosch University in South Africa, making its first appearance in a developing country. It will be a good time and place to take stock of progress on re-evaluating the default measure of research quality.

Just as the rapid growth of mobile devices in many parts of Africa has spurred innovations in social entrepreneurship, mobile health applications and educational opportunities, so too could networked science based on OA be a source of innovation and local problem-solving in the developing world.

Leslie Chan is director of Bioline International, a non-profit electronic publishing collaboration, and supervisor for the International Development Studies programme at the University of Toronto.

REFERENCES

[1] Royal Society Knowledge, networks and nations: global scientific collaboration in the 21st century (2011)

[2] Wagner, Caroline. The new invisible college: science for development. Washington DC: Brookings Institution Press (2008)

source: http://www.scidev.net/en/science-communication/open-access/opinions/unlock-local-research-potential-with-open-access–1.html

Geospatial information can empower decision-making on "extremely important" concerns in developing countries, such as development andenvironmental conservation, said Susan Wolfinbarger, from the Geospatial Technologies and Human Rights Project at the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Global geospatial group to promote equitable data access

Gozde Zorlu

18 August 2011 | EN

A high-level global group promoting geospatial information could help developing countries gainbetter access to data to help tackle issues such as climate change, conservation and disastermanagement.

The UN has set up an expert committee and a programme on global geospatial information management under its Economic and Social Council to encourage international cooperation and establish best practice on the use of geographic data, collected by technologies such as remote sensing and the global positioning system (GPS).

The decision, announced last month (27 July), was triggered by a report earlier this year by the UN secretary-general that concluded that many developing countries have a "serious lack of institutional capacity to harness the enormous potential of geospatial information technologies and to build a sustainable national infrastructure".

There have been several efforts to manage such information, including the Permanent Committee for Geospatial Data Infrastructure of the Americas (PC-IDEA) and the Permanent Committee on GIS Infrastructure for Asia and the Pacific (PCGIAP).

"But these discussions have been regional in focus," said Paul Cheung, director of the new initiative and head of the UN’s statistics division in New York.

"There is a need for a global platform, for all countries to come together and focus on all of the issues. That is why we have created this committee," he told SciDev.Net.

A key task will be to standardise geospatial information and applications to enable the sharing of data and services across borders.

According to Cheung, geospatial data is increasingly owned by multinational corporations, which sell software and platforms to developing countries that may not have the capacity to know what the best products are or how best to use them. The new committee could help represent developing countries and advise them on building up their national institutions.

"Spatial information and analysis lie at the heart of nearly all major international peace, global health and economic development problems," Mark Becker, a geospatial applications expert at the Earth Institute at Columbia University, United States, told SciDev.Net.

"Having a central committee focused on setting standards for accuracy of data and guidelines for the fair redistribution of data is essential," he said.

Becker added that the new committee could increase the efficient use of spatial information in projects for developing countries, such as managing refugee centres and immunisation programmes.

"If you can easily discover and download data that is critical for your operations and not have to create it yourself you have increased your efficiency," he said.

Geospatial information can empower decision-making on "extremely important" concerns in developing countries, such as development andenvironmental conservation, said Susan Wolfinbarger, from the Geospatial Technologies and Human Rights Project at the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"Given the rapid development of technologies such as remote sensing, mapping and GPS, a group of experts on geographic technology is essential to help develop standards for data quality, cooperation and use of geospatial information," Wolfinbarger added.

The first UN high-level forum on geospatial information management is scheduled to take place in Seoul, Korea, in October to bring together countries, international organisations and the private sector.

"But at the end of the day, it is governments that will have to decide on issues," said Cheung.

Link to UN secretary-general’s ‘Global geospatial information management’ report [217kB]

source: http://www.scidev.net/en/science-communication/open-access/news/global-geospatial-group-to-promote-equitable-data-access.html

InforMEA was launched during the Second Steering Committee Meeting of the MEA Information and Knowledge Management Initiative, which is supported by UNEP. The meeting is bringing together approximately 25 representatives from MEAs, UN agencies and observers in Glion, Switzerland, from 14-16 June 2011, where participants also will  brainstorm possibilities for collaboration related to online reporting, an MEA college, and extensions of the InforMEA (UN Information Portal on MEAs) interoperability project.

In a keynote speech at the launch, John Scanlon, Secretary General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), noted that InforMEA provides a useful and tangible project that seeks to deliver information that parties want. He emphasized the need to give coherent expression to the entire body of international environmental law and to show how MEAs are relevant to sustainable development in the lead-up to the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20). Scanlon said this portal will contribute to these efforts.

Maria Louisa Silva, Executive Secretary of the Barcelona Convention (Mediterranean Action Plan), also offered a keynote speech. She highlighted the importance of innovation and the development of linkages among conventions, and noted that these activities require information exchange.

To announce the launch, UNEP and the MEAs prepared joint press releases. [IISD RS Sources] [InforMEA Webportal] [UNEP Press Release] [Ramsar Convention Press Release] [CMS Press Release]

source: http://uncsd.iisd.org/news/unep-meas-launch-informea-webportal/

As of June 2, 2011, all PDF versions of books published by the National Academies Press (NAP) will be downloadable free of charge to anyone. This includes current catalog of more than 4,000 books plus future reports published by NAP.*

Free access to online content supports the mission of NAP—publisher for the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council–to improve government decision making and public policy, increase public education and understanding, and promote the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge in matters involving science, engineering, technology, and health.

In 1994, NAP began offering free content online. Before today’s

announcement, all PDFs were free to download in developing countries,

and 65 percent of them were available for free to any user.

Like no other organization, the National Academies can enlist the

nation’s foremost scientists, engineers, health professionals, and other

experts to address the scientific and technical aspects of society’s

most pressing problems through the authoritative and independent reports

published by NAP.

By Catherine Saez on 18 April 2011 @ 3:36 pm

Biodiversity and climate change issues are coming together under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), according to a new working paper from the University of Edinburgh.

The CBD is engaged in questions relating to climate change, it found. In particular, the CBD has progressively addressed legal and policy implications of the impacts on biodiversity of climate change, as well as mitigation and adaptation measures.

The author, Elisa Morgera, a lecturer in European environmental law at the University of Edinburgh School of Law, analysed the links between biodiversity loss and climate change, and reviewed the main climate change-related outcomes of the 10th CBD Conference of the Parties (COP), in October 2010.

According to Morgera, the CBD “has been steadily working on climate-change-related issues since its seventh meeting in 2004.” At COP 10, delegates agreed on increased cooperation between the CBD and the international climate change regime, in particular with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

However, “the ultimate value of the developments under the CBD related to climate change rests with the systematic application at all levels of environmental governance of its guidelines aimed at ensuring that climate change measures are environmentally, socially, and culturally sustainable,” the paper said ^[1].

Related Articles:

• Climate-Ready Crop Patents Present Danger For Biodiversity, Group Says ^[2]
• UN Climate Change Talks Start With Little Faith From Observers ^[3]
• Panellists See Critical Moment For International Policy On Biodiversity And Trade ^[4]

Categories: Biodiversity/Genetic Resources/Biotech,English,Environment,IP Live,Language,Themes,United Nations,Venues

Article printed from Intellectual Property Watch: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog

URL to article: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2011/04/18/biodiversity-climate-change-policy-on-convergent-roads-paper-says/

URLs in this post:

[1] the paper said: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1753810&http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1753810

[2] Climate-Ready Crop Patents Present Danger For Biodiversity, Group Says: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/10/26/climate-ready-crop-patents-present-danger-for-biodiversity-group-says/

[3] UN Climate Change Talks Start With Little Faith From Observers: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/11/29/un-climate-change-talks-start-with-little-faith-from-observers/

[4] Panellists See Critical Moment For International Policy On Biodiversity And Trade: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/04/23/panellists-see-critical-moment-for-international-policy-on-biodiversity-and-trade/

Click here to print.

read full item here: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6018/703.full.html

See : http://www.iucnredlist.org/technical-documents/spatial-data

Note that the Globally Threatened Birds are available from the Birdlife Data Zone.

The 2010 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species contains assessments for almost 56,000 species, of which about 28,000 have spatial data. This spatial data collection provided below is for most of the comprehensivley assessed taxonomic groups such as amphibians, mammals, threatened birds, reef-building corals, groupers, wrasses, angelfish, butterflyfish, seasnakes, seagrasses and mangroves. Spatial data is also provided for many of the reptile species that have been assessed. Other groups will be added to this collection once they are mapped. It is important to note that some species listed as Data Deficient are not mapped. These data are made freely available to the public to help inform conservation planning and other decision making processes. For more information about the assessment process, please see the IUCN Red List website (http://www.iucnredlist.org/technical-documents/assessment-process).

The data are held in shapefiles, the ESRI native format and contain the known range of each species. Ranges are depicted as polygons. DBF files accompanying each polygon contain taxonomic information, and contain information on distribution status, sources and other details about the maps (see metadata document).  To limit the size of the shapefiles that are available to download, the higher taxonomy is not included in the data sets, only the genus and species name. The higher taxonomy including the current Red List Category information is available under each section, in excel format (these are the same data you would get if you ran a search on the Red List web site and exported the results as a CSV file), and you are able to join this file with the shapefiles when downloaded.

For ease of distribution and downloading the data is divided by taxonomic groups.

The data is available both in ESRI File Geodatabase format and the ESRI Shapefile format and is held in geographical coordinates. Please note that the files are large, and download times could be quite lengthy.

While this data is made freely available to the public, please note that unfortunately we cannot provide technical support for use of the data in analyses or general GIS support.

Data Links

Mammals
Birds
Groupers

Amphibians
Angelfish
Wrasses

Corals
Butterflyfish
Mangroves

Reptiles
Parrotfish
Seagrasses

Mammals

The ranges are available as a single data set (file Geodatabase) for all mammals or broken out into smaller data sets as shapefiles. The ranges are broken out by grouping families containing predominantly marine and terrestrial species.

The terrestrial file includes all mammals, excluding species in the families Otariidae, Phocidae and Odobenidae (i.e. all seals, sea lions and walrus), Balaenidae, Balaenopteridae, Delphinidae, Eschrichtidae, Iniidae, Monodontidae, Neobalaenidae, Phocoenidae, Physteridae, Platanistidae, and Ziphiidae (all whales, dolphins and porpoises), and everything in the Order Sirenia (manatees and dugongs). The latter families are included in the Marine shapefile.

All mammals – 2010 (zip file, 365.7 MB)

Mammals – terrestrial (zip file, 374 MB)

Mammals – marine (zip file, 356.4 MB)

See metadata document for further information.

Mammals – full taxonomy and Red List status (note that there are more species in this list than are mapped and the list does not include subspecies or subpopulations). The list presented as a Red List search result with links to each species fact sheet can also be found by clicking on this permalink:http://www.iucnredlist.org/apps/redlist/search/link/4cc84a88-1fd94435.

source of this article: http://www.iucnredlist.org/technical-documents/spatial-data

These documents include a significant body of information of value to audiences around the world ranging from researchers to the general public, and from educators to decision-makers. Items are available in 9 different formats, for maximum accessibility, and are published according to open access standards in a forum which welcomes and encourages both use and contribution, while respecting attribution rights.

The internet archive website has instant download statistics, and items rank highly in Google searches. In only a few months the UNEP-WCMC materials have already been downloaded 9,307 times (by 14^th Oct 2010) – with no specific promotion other than through informal networks such as the Conservation Commons or the Ape Alliance list-serve email group…. We invite you to join us in using and sharing this new free online biodiversity resource.

click here to download the PDF version of the flyer…

Using the latest satellite images, users can pinpoint individual protected areas – such as national parks or marine reserves – and zoom in for information on endangered species, native plant life or types of terrain.

Protected Planet also offers visitors the opportunity to upload photographs of their trips to protected areas, write travelogues of what they saw and experienced for Wikipedia and recommend places of interest nearby—information that can be shared through social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Flickr.

click here for the BBC coverage on protectedplanet.net .

Protectedplanet.net applies an innovative, ‘Web 2.0’ approach to conservation and will be a powerful tool to help monitor future biodiversity targets. With half a million photos already on the site, protectedplanet.net has the potential to supply vast amounts of biodiversity information to the global community and, most importantly, to prove that it has never been easier for one person to make a difference to conservation.