GLOBALBIODIVERSITYGLOBALBIODIVERSITYINFORMATIONFACILITYINFORMATIONFACILITY

Vishwas ChavanVishwas Chavanvchavan@gbif.orgvchavan@gbif.org

WWW.GBIF.ORG

WWW.GBIF.ORG

Towards demand-driven publishing of Natural

History Collections Data: Recommendations of the

GBIF GSAP-NHC TG

Towards demand-driven publishing of Natural

History Collections Data: Recommendations of the

GBIF GSAP-NHC TG

Building the Biodiversity Informatics CommonsBuilding the Biodiversity Informatics Commons

SPNHC-CBA 2010 Annual ConferenceJune 1-5, 2010Ottawa, CANADA

GBIF GSAP-NHC Task GroupGBIF GSAP-NHC Task Group

1. TG commissioned in 2008 Q3

2. Survey on challenges & concerns to digitisation

3. Draft report submitted to GBIFS in April 2010; in process of endorsement by GBIF Science Committee

i. Summary of recommendations

ii. The size of universe of collections data: elements for preliminary approachiii. Results of survey on challenges & concernsiv. Approaches to the prioritisation of digitisationv. Geographical & taxonomic metadata to set priorities in specimen digitisation

GSAP-NHC: 3 RecommendationsGSAP-NHC: 3 Recommendations

1. Discovery: facilitate access to information about non-digital collection resources

2. Digitisation: increase the efficiency of data capture and to enhance data quality

3. Publication: improve & promote global infrastructure to mobilise digitised collections data

GSAP-NHC Recommendation 1: DiscoveryGSAP-NHC Recommendation 1: Discovery

GBIF must facilitate access to information about non-digital collection resources

1. Publicise research potential of collections through metadata• Author & publish metadata• Strengthen metadata publishing infrastructure

2. Assessing the number of un-digitised specimens• determine the size of the holdings of un-digitised specimens

world-wide

GSAP-NHC Recommendation 2: DigitisationGSAP-NHC Recommendation 2: Digitisation

GBIF must work with collections to continue to increase the efficiency of specimen data capture and to enhance data quality

1. Technical measures: • industrialise, technological innovations, QA/QC, fitness-for-use, data

dictionaries

2. Attribution, professional credit, institutional priorities• Data publishing framework, metadata as data paper, institutional

recognitions

3. Funding

GSAP-NHC Recommendation 3: PublicationGSAP-NHC Recommendation 3: Publication

GBIF must continue to improve and promote the global infrastructure used to mobilise digitised collections data

1. Technical measures: hosting environment, persistent identifiers

2. Outreach activities: southern hemisphere collections, small & medium sized collections

3. Political measures: national & thematic demand-driven digitisation strategies

GSAP-NHC Recommendations: What’s Next?GSAP-NHC Recommendations: What’s Next?

1. Discussion session at SPNCH-CBA 2010

2. Release of Report: July 2010

3. Metadata as data paper: Sept/Oct 2010

4. Statement by GBIF Governing board on discovery & publishing of NHC data