Open Access Status Report on behalf of Indian National Science Academy

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Open Access Status Reporton behalf of Indian
National Science Academy

• Krishan Lal
• National Physical Laboratory
• New Delhi

Presentation during Berlin 2 Open Access Steps
Towards Implementation of the Berlin Declaration
on Open Access to knowledge in Sciences and
Humanities, CERN Geneva, 12 May 2004
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Indian National Science Academy

• Apex body of Indian scientists working in all
  sectors of science and technology
• Promotes scientific knowledge in India including
  its practical applications for national welfare
• Coordinates among Scientific Academies,
  Societies, Institutions, Government Scientific
  Departments and Services
• Acts as a body of scientists of eminence for the
  promotion and safeguarding of the interests of
  scientists in India and to present
  internationally the scientific work done in the
  country
• Promotes and maintains liaison between Science
  and Humanities

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Indian National Science Academy

• Present Fellowship of the Academy
• Fellows 744 covering all disciplines of science
• Foreign Fellows 91
• INSA is the adhering body in India to the
  International Council for Science and its various
  affiliated Unions/Committees/Commissions, etc
• INSA has scientist exchange programmes with a
  large number of Academies and similar bodies in
  different countries
• Academy collaborates with other academies and
  similar bodies of the world to focus on important
  issues facing the world like Population

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Indian Seminars and Workshops on Open Access

• Two Workshops organized by Indian Academy of
  Sciences, Bangalore on Open Access Journals March
  2002
• INSA Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data
  and Information, 27 December 2003, NCL Pune
• Workshops on Open Access by M S Swaminathan
  Foundation, Chennai, 2-4 and 6-8 May 2004

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Phenomenal Growth of Science

• Democracy of intellect
• Free sharing of scientific data and information
  through scientific journals
• Evaluation of scientists and institutions
  emphasizes on publications in high impact factor
  (expensive) journals
• Today most universities find difficult to
  subscribe to important science journals

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S T a Key Element in Development Strategy

• Governments utilize ST to solve societal
  problems of
• Food
• Healthcare
• Environmental protection
• Governments need data for planning and
  implementing welfare schemes
• RD projects supported by public funds also
  generate new data and knowledge
• Open access becomes an important issue

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Open Access to Data and Information

• Scientific data and knowledge are potential tools
  for wealth generation. These create conflicting
  interests.
• Laws are being enacted or existing laws are being
  widened, deepened and redefined to more
  rigorously the Intellectual Property and
  neighbouring rights.
• These situations limit the public domain and
  there is an encroachment of the traditional
  scientific domain and free availability of data.

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INSA Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data
and Information

• Main Issues
• IPR issues global demands, societal concerns and
  legal angles
• Open Access Global perspective
• Global Exchange of Meteorological Data issues
  and solutions
• Bioinformatics commercialization of data bases,
  quality assurance issues
• Quality of Data
• Digital Storage, Publications (journals) and
  Dissemination digital libraries, journals, and
  constraints in developing economies

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INSA Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data
and Information

• Dr. Krishan Lal Welcome and background to the
  Seminar highlighting some of the recent
  international initiatives.
• Prof M.S. Valiathan Remarks on Key Issues in
  Open Access
• Dr. R.A. Mashelkar Inaugural Lecture on
  Scientific Data Information The Developing
  World Perspective on Access and IP Protection.
• Professor Shuichi Iwata Basics of Open Access of
  Scientific Data
• Dr. R.R. Kelkar Access to Meteorological Data

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INSA Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data
and Information

• Prof. N. Balakrishnan Digital Library - A
  million books to the web - Technological
  Challenges and the Concept of 4C - Consortium for
  Compensating for Creating Contents.
• Prof. A.S. Kolaskar Future Trends in
  Bioinformatics - Open Access
• Prof. R. Kochhar Collation of Data
• Dr. D.K. Sahu Open Access in Medical Science An
  Indian Perspective
• Dr. S. Arunachalam Open Access and Increasing
  Visibility for Developing Country Science.

Participation About 150 persons, majority of
them were INSA Fellows
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INSA Seminar Some Highlights

• There is a global system of free sharing of
  meteorological data among national meteorology
  services- introduced in 1970s
• However, weather information is vital for several
  military operations and therefore these services
  are under Ministries of Defense in several
  countries

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INSA Seminar Some Highlights

• Several reputed International organizations have
  issued statements on free sharing data in the
  field of environmental science. These include
• ICSU, IGBP, GCOS, SWCC, SCOSTEP, ISSC, URSI,
  WOCE, WMO, WDC, IOC, OECD, UNCED..

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INSA Seminar Some Highlights

• Technology Driven Vision for the Universal
  Digital Library
• A mission to digitize 1 Million Books and make
  them freely available
• To be a leading and contributing partner to world
  wide efforts in making knowledge free
• In the Digital Economy- Companies that give more
  and more software free capitalize more

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INSA Seminar Some Highlights

• Issues Regarding Databases
• Up-to-date-ness
• Accuracy
• Structure of Databases-granularity and
  open-ended-ness
• Disappearance

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INSA Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data
and Information

• Issues that could not be covered
• Open Access perspective of the Government
  (Department of Science and Technology)
• A Major Area of Conflicting Scientific, Strategic
  and Economic Interests Geo science and
  engineering

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Other Important International Initiatives

• World Summit on Information Society, Geneva 2003,
  Geneva in 2005
• Symposium organized by five well known
  international bodies, ICS (ICSU), UNESCO, The US
  National Academies, CODATA and ICSTI, held at
  UNESCO premises, March 2003
• Discussion on wide ranging topics in view of
  WSIS

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Right to Information Initiative of Some Socially
Active Organizations

• A law had been passed by Rajasthan Legislative
  Assembly granting free access to information on
  development projects
• To improve transparency leading to higher
  efficiency and lower corruption level

Rajasthan
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Thank You