José Miguel RUBIO IGLESIAS Earth Observation Sector - Management of Natural Resources Unit

1. GEOSS Data-CORE/GCI Subgroup Progress ReportData Sharing Working Group MeetingBrussels, 11th February 2013 José Miguel RUBIO IGLESIAS Earth Observation Sector - Management of Natural Resources Unit Directorate Environment Directorate General Research & Innovation EUROPEAN COMMISSION Jose-Miguel.Rubio-Iglesias@ec.europa.eu

2. Call for GEOSSDataCORE resources • On behalf of the DSWG, in October 2012 the Commission started contacting GEO Members and Participant Organisations who had pledged resources to the GEOSS Data-CORE to make their open resources visible and available as such. • We have been also asking potential contributors to the GEOSS Data-CORE (ECDS, PANGAEA, SERVIR, etc.). • After a first call for data with a moderate response, in the wake of the GEO Plenary (December 2012) we sent reminders to those who had not responded. • The second call was more successful, with actions being taken by contributors like UKGEO or PANGAEA and commitments made by SERVIR, ITC or INTERACT Project.

3. GEOSS-DataCORE original pledges (I)

4. GEOSS-DataCORE original pledges (II)

5. GEOSS-DataCORE original pledges (III)

6. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – 1st stage (I)

7. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – 1st stage (II)

8. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – 2nd stage (I)

9. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – 2nd stage (II)

10. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – Issues (I) EEA Datasets - They implemented a dedicated catalogue which contains just GEOSS DataCORE datasets. - They also updated the records in the Component and Service Registry. ICSU (World Data System) - They will contribute the WDS to the GEOSS-DataCORE but once they have implemented the WDS Open Metadata Catalogue (available in 2013) which will be registered and tagged as such. - They are concerned about the duplication of records that may result from brokering both big capacities and their individual members at the same time. - Some updates should be made to the CSR (mainly with regards to the affiliation of some resources, i.e. there is no ICSU-WDS, which is now formally a GEO PO).

11. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – Issues (II) ESA Datasets - "(…) While there are still open issues, ERS and ENVISAT datasets will not be registered strictly speaking as GEOSS Data-CORE datasets(…). There is no restriction at all, users are only requested to register (…)" - "(…) For what concerns the Sentinel data, the fully open data policy presented by ESA several months ago has still to be approved by the European Institutions and therefore the Sentinel datasets cannot be declared as GEOSS Data-CORE datasets (…)" - "(…) For what concerns the data provided by the GMES Services, ESA is not responsible for declaring and registering those datasets as compatiblewith GEOSS Data Sharing policy (…)" • EC – JRC Datasets (among them EU-SOILS) • - JRC datasets are accessible only for non-commercial purposes (i.e. with restrictions). • - The development of the EU Open Data Portal may change things in the future but for the time being they cannot commit anything.

12. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – Issues (III) • Eumetsat Datasets • - Their intention is to implement the GEOSS Data-CORE metadata tags in their CSW interface during the first half of 2013. • - They noted that if the guidelines provided are to be used as a baseline, the provision of a more formal document would have been appropriate (e.g.: reference number, issue or issuing organisation information). • - Technical questions were raised (some of them not yet responded): • - What happens if they have more than one "UseLimitation"? • - Where should the tags other than "geossdatacore" be stored? • - More details about "geossAttribution". BfG – River gauging stations in Africa - They are working to get the permission from national hydrological data providers to contribute their data to the GEOSS DataCORE. - However the technical infrastructure is not ready to announce the availability of such data via the GEOSS.

13. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – Issues (IV) ECDS Catalogue - "We will definitely promote the GEOSS DataCORE within Swedish research (…) Two major Swedish research funding organizations have introduced explicit requirements for open data access in their research grants, and we expect more agencies to follow that model (…)" - "ECDS (catalogue) is registered as a GEOSS-component (…) SomeECDS data resources may have additional restrictions, so for the moment we decided not to flag ECDS as a whole as “GEOSS DataCORE (…)" - "We still need to think about the most practical way to handle this (…) We expect ECDS’ content of data resource descriptions to grow continuously, so the most attractive solution (…) will involve automatic metadata exchange mechanisms, many of which seem to be supported by our catalogue(…)" - Regarding data policies (…) we have recommended our providers to use “open licensing schemes such as Creative Commons Attribution (CC_BY)” (….) Intuitively, “CC_BY” seems to map pretty well with the tag-combination “geossDataCore” and “geossAttribution" (…).

14. Contacting GEOSS-DataCORE providers – Issues (V) UKGEO - They are following up the pledges but they have some questions like: - "How are the data being used so far?" - "Can I have a look at the GEOPortal and see the way the registered data pledges are available?" - "I’m not quite sure about the exact actions people need to take to upload the data. It might be helpful if you could let me have a set of instructions for this." PANGAEA - They have updated the corresponding record in CSR and now it is visible as "GEOSSDataCORE" and "NoMonetaryCharge" INTERACT Datasets - Decision on what to pledge to be taken during the project meeting in March.

15. Lessons learnt (so far) • Most of the entities contacted responded positively to our call. • Nevertheless, most of them have just confirmed their contributions and still actions need to be taken. • Those who are already taking some action appear not to completely understand what they actually have to do.We need simple step-by-step guidelines. • We cannot forget that GEOSS is built on a voluntary basis so we need to respond quickly at the questions and doubts raised by those who are willing to participate. Providers want a named Point-of-Contact they can interact with directly. • As a general remark, following up the contributions to the GEOSS-DataCORE and to the GEOSS in general should be a continuous effort. We need to look at how the GEO Secretariat can provide dedicated support for this work.

16. Future Plans • Follow-up the commitments by those already contacted, supporting them in registering and flagging their resources in the GEOSS. • Ask for further potential contributors to the GEOSS Data-CORE, especially to the Sprint To Ministerial demonstrators. • Ensure the real access to the GEOSS Data-CORE data, by checking the provided links in the metadata available through the GEO Portal. • Launch a second reminder to those who still have not responded. • Any suggestions?

17. Thank you! Find out more: http://ec.europa.eu/research/environment/index_en.cfm