A New Resource For Agriculture

Why is open access to research and other data important?

Every year institutions, researchers and practitioners generate thousands of datasets, reports and articles about development issues. Yet much of this knowledge remains underused, locked away in silos. I am particularly interested in open data. Two of my expert colleagues, Tim Davies from the University of Southampton and Duncan Edwards from the UK Institute of Development Studies, believe that open data means not only publishing data freely but allowing reuse and putting it online as linked data to create a web of connected datasets.

Open data on the web makes it possible to take information on research from many sources, for example, and generate ‘mash-ups’, which make it available in different places, on different platforms, and in ways that support action and impact. Open data can be remixed to answer key questions in ways that were not possible before.