Open Science in the Global South

Background  

This project aims to position scientists and science systems in the Global South at the cutting edge of data-intensive open science, through the development of efficiencies of scale, the creation of critical mass through shared capacities, and amplify impact through a commonality of purpose and voice at regional levels. 
 
Regional collaboration that develops ‘platforms’ or ‘commons’ could be a creative response to poorly funded science systems. These platforms could provide and manage access to data, computational hardware, connectivity and the tools and concepts required for effective practice, in training and capacity development, and in data-intensive application activities directed towards productive scientific, societal and economic outputs and outcomes that are regionally relevant. 
 
In collaboration with CODATA, the Council has been working with its Regional Offices and other partner organizations to create regional Open Science Platforms that will convene and coordinate regional interests, ideas, people, institutions and resources needed to advance data-intensive, solutions-oriented research in the Global South. They are intended to create critical mass through shared capacity, and to amplify impact through their shared purpose and voice. The Platforms will function as federated systems, providing connective tissue between dispersed infrastructures and actors, bringing them together in advancing data-driven science in the Global South for social and economic benefit. 

A pilot study for a Pan-African Open Science Platform (AOSP) was launched in December 2016 with the support of the South African Department of Science and Innovation and in collaboration with the Academy of Science of South Africa and the South African National Research Foundation. 

Inspired by the African example, there are now parallel initiatives in the process of development in Asia and the Pacific and in Latin America and the Caribbean. The potential for a successful South-South network of regional platforms, closely connected to analogous developments in the Global North, augurs well for healthy global collaboration as equals rather than as in the donor-recipient model of the recent past. The ISC will seek support for such a network. A Global Open Science Commons may be a practicable and desirable longer-term outcome. 

This project started under our previous Action Plan 2019-2021. 

Activities and impact 

• April 2020: The National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africa agreed to host the African Open Science Platform (AOSP) Project Office for the next 3 to 5 years. South Africa’s Department of Science and Innovation (DSI), key institutions in Africa, and the International Science Council (ISC), the AOSP (Science for the Future, the Future of Science) makes the case for bold action to mobilise the scientific community in Africa in responding to the challenges of the digital revolution. The new paradigm of Open Science is a powerful driver for scientific research and scholarship and its application to social, economic and global environmental priorities. 
• June 2021: CODATA launched the Global Open Science Cloud initiative, which aims to encourage cooperation, alignment and interoperability between Open Science Clouds.