Free access to environment research for developing countries

Almost fifty Governing Council delegates attended a briefing on how to get free access to environmental research through the On-line Access to Research on the Environment (OARE) initiative.

Under this initiave, access is given to the latest research at low or no cost to developing countries. Countries will have access to the Research4Life on-line library of more than 7,500 peer-reviewed scientific journals, books and databases from 130 publishers. The main sponsors of the project are the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Yale University, Cornell University, Food and Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization and Microsoft.

A short documentary showed how scientific research can make a difference in the lives of communities in Kenya’s Rift Valley Province where the research has been used to address pollution of the Njoro River. The result is a reduction of waterborne diseases among the local population and cleaner use of the river.

Themes covered by the research include climate change, mitigation of natural environmental disasters and pollution and water and sanitation. UN-HABITAT invited delegates to register for the service to help them address important environmental problems in their cities.

Source: UN-Habitat, 01 Apr 2009

OARE and the other free access initiatives for developing countries – HINARI (health) and AGORA (agriculture) – have been criticised in the past for being a “halfway house of limited access and unhelpful restrictions” (for example countries like India are excluded as well as NGOs in developed countries). Providing access to scientific literature for all can be more effectively achieved through “self-archiving technologies such as pre-print servers, institutional repositories and open access journals”.