RE: OARE Project Funded at Yale

["Maurice Long" <mlong@bmjgroup.com>]

OARE, HINARI and AGORA

Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE) is the third in a 
trilogy of programmes designed to provide access to relevant journals to 
the poorest countries. In January 2002, in partnership with the Geneva 
based World Health Organization, six leading STM publishers launched the 
Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI), providing free 
online access to the full text of journals for researchers and other 
professionals in not for profit research institutes, universities, 
medical, nursing, public health, dental and pharmacy schools, teaching 
hospitals and appropriate government ministries in 69 of the poorest 
countries. From the beginning, much of the critical infrastructure support 
was provided by Yale University Library. In January 2003, access to the 
growing collection of journals was offered to the same kind of 
institutions in a further 44 countries, most of which were designated at 
that time by the World Bank as Lower Middle Income. In these countries, 
institutions are asked to contribute US $1000 per annum for access. The 
publishers remit all fees collected to the WHO for training and outreach 
programmes in the use of HINARI. There are now nearly eighty publisher 
partners, and hundreds of specialist learned societies offering more than 
3000 key journals in HINARI.

In October 2003, working with the Food and Agriculture Organization in 
Rome, the publishers launched the Access to Global Online Research in 
Agriculture (AGORA), providing access to journals in agriculture, 
forestry, fisheries, nutrition and related topics to researchers in the 
original 69 poorest countries which had access to HINARI. A key partner in 
AGORA has been Cornell University's Mann Library, providing critical 
infrastructure support, as Yale provides to HINARI. Currently, 27 leading 
publishers participate in AGORA, offering access to more than 800 
journals. In December 2005 at a meeting in London, the publishing partners 
agreed to extend AGORA to the 44 Lower Middle Income countries which can 
access HINARI, again for an annual nominal fee of $1000 per institution.

It was at this HINARI-AGORA partners' meeting that the publishers agreed 
to develop OARE, under the sponsorship of the United Nations Environment 
Programme, based in Nairobi. Again, Yale will provide the essential 
infrastructure, and eventually training and outreach programmes.

OARE is the logical and synergistic extension of the health and 
agriculture research access initiatives. There have been two guiding 
principle as these programmes have developed: work together as partners, 
and re-invent no wheels. Time is short, and resources are limited. Since 
January 2001, two key UN agencies, the International Association of 
Science, Technical and Medical Publishers (STM), scores of individual 
publishers and two major university libraries have worked as an integrated 
partnership. They have been joined by other collaborators: The Rockefeller 
Foundation, the UK's Department For International Development, The 
National Library of Medicine (USA), the Special Programme for Research and 
Training in Tropical Diseases, HighWire Press, Eduserve-Athens, University 
of Manchester, etc. The partners welcome the grants from the Hewlett and 
Macarthur Foundations to support the development of OARE. It is expected 
that OARE will be tested in the middle of this year, with a view to full 
launch in January 2007.

During 2006, User and Partner Reviews are being conducted. At a meeting at 
the National Academy of Sciences in June 2005, the HINARI and AGORA 
partners agreed that subject to satisfactory reviews, the programmes would 
be linked to the timescale of the internationally agreed Millennium 
Development Goals. The Review will inevitably point up where the 
programmes are failing as well as succeeding, and the next Partners' 
meeting, scheduled for July 2006, will determine the shape of the 
programmes from 1 January 2007. HINARI, AGORA and OARE cannot solve the 
severe health, nutrition and environment challenges facing some of the 
poorest nations on earth. It cannot even solve all the information 
difficulties facing researchers in these countries, since there are still 
huge technical and connectivity problems which demand other solutions. But 
we hope that a unique partnership is helping to bridge a significant 
information gap. Indications are that it is beginning to do that.

Maurice Long
Publisher Coordinator
AGORA-HINARI-OARE


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu]On Behalf Of Ann Okerson
Sent: 03 January 2006 23:06
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: OARE Project Funded at Yale


Of possible interest.
__________________________

December 2005


CONTACT:

For immediate release:

Grants to Enable Developing World to Access Leading Scientific Research

        New Haven, Conn.-Two grants totaling $500,000 will support Yale
University's participation in an international consortium to make
prestigious scientific journals in the environmental sciences available
online, at little or no cost, to the developing world

        The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the John D. and
Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation each have given $250,000 to Yale to help
establish Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE). OARE, a
digital internet library for developing countries, will provide access to
the peer-reviewed scientific literature of leading international
publishing houses. Organizations eligible to use OARE will include
approximately 1,000 public, non-profit institutions in more than 100
underdeveloped nations in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean and
Eastern Europe. Literature in environmental chemistry, economics, law and
policy, and other environmental subjects such as botany, conservation
biology, ecology and zoology will be available through a portal presented
in several world languages, including Arabic, English, French, Portuguese
and Spanish.

        Yale's OARE activities will be directed by Oswald Schmitz, professor
of population and community ecology and associate dean of academic affairs
at the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and Ann Okerson,
associate university librarian for collections and international programs.

         James Gustav Speth, Dean of the Yale School of Forestry and
Environmental Studies, stated, "Thanks to advances in information and
communication technologies and the great generosity of many leading
scientific publishers and foundations, we now have an unprecedented
opportunity to provide environmental institutions in 110 less-developed
countries intellectual resources that we in the developed world take for
granted."

        Alice Prochaska, University Librarian added: "We are eager to work
together to increase the ability of leading scientists in developing
countries to conduct their own high-quality research and develop their own
educational programs in the environmental sciences. Helping the world
benefit from Yale's wealth of expertise by extending access to information
and resources is central to the library's mission."

        Published in the United States and Europe under copyright and with
annual subscription fees averaging $1,000, the prestigious journals in
which a majority of scientific research is published are too costly for
most developing nations to purchase. OARE will enable countries to build
their own higher education programs in the environmental sciences, educate
their own leaders, conduct their own research, publish their own
scientific findings and disseminate information to policy makers and the
public.

        Next year, OARE will be offered to users in 70 developing nations
with a per capita gross national product (GNP) of $1,000 or less in the
first phase of the project's implementation. In the project's second
phase, approximately 45 more countries with GNP per capita between $1,000
and $3,000 will be enrolled.

        Yale will develop OARE in cooperation with the United Nations
Environment Programme, the World Health Organization, the Food and
Agriculture Organization, Cornell University and leading scientific
publishers around the world. Yale will create software for OARE's secure
internet portal, organize and updates its database of scientific
literature, attract new publishers to the consortium, and develop
partnerships between the consortium and American and European institutions
to expand internet connectivity and offer training.

        Paul Bendiks Walberg, a recent graduate of the School of Management
and School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, and Kimberly Parker, head
of the university library's electronic collections, conceived the OARE
project over the course of the last three years. The project is inspired
by Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI), a World
Heath Organization program in which Yale played a leading role, that has
strengthened public health services in developing countries by providing
access to research in the medical sciences.

        The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, based in Menlo Park,
Calif., supports activities in education, the environment, global
development, the performing arts and population. The MacArthur Foundation,
which has offices around the world, is dedicated to helping groups and
individuals foster lasting improvement in the human condition.

##


______________________________________________________________________
This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System.
For more information please visit http://www.messagelabs.com/email
______________________________________________________________________