Governments could come under pressure to make information on biological resources openly available, following a decision approved at last week's conference of parties (COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity in Brazil. According to its decision, the COP "invites parties and other governments, as appropriate, to provide free and open access to all past, present, and future public-good research results, assessments, maps and databases on biodiversity, in accordance with national and international legislation". The language is vague, but according to Donat Agosti, a research associate at the American Museum of Natural History and the Swiss Naturmuseum, "This is breakthrough. It means we can talk to our governments and argue for open access to this body of information, referring to this COP decision," he says. "But nothing will happen unless pressure and demand can be built up to implement it." Agosti has long pointed to the irony that researchers in developing countries - where most biodiversity is found - cannot access information about their nations' species (see Copyrighting species descriptions is 'biopiracy'). He is concerned that if information is not made available, governments could consider it a commodity they can sell. He adds that efforts to conserve the planet's biodiversity depend on free and open access to information about it.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 4/07/2006 09:00:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
