15th – 16th October (15th October 14:00 Paris Time)

Science International is a new coalition of the major international science bodies to bring its members’ combined international representation and credibility to act as the global voice of policy for science. Further information can be found in the attached document.

The draft accord will be prepared by an expert working group be chaired by Professor Geoffrey Boulton, President of the ICSU Committee on Data for Science and Technology (CODATA). The group will include selected experts from other Science International partner organisations – ICSU, the InterAcademy Partnership, The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS), and the International Social Science Council (ISSC). The draft accord will be refined by the expert working group and circulated on 9 October prior to a meeting of the working group at the ICSU Secretariat in Paris on 15-16 October 2015.

During the meeting, membership of Science International partner organisations will be given an opportunity to raise questions and provide feedback via participation in a webinar.

The precise timings of the webinars (to accommodate different timezones and maximise participation) will be provided closer to the meeting. Following the meeting, an additional group of “readers” will provide feedback on the initial draft, before refinement of the concordat up until the first meeting of Science International in December.

The objective is for the international science accord to express the essential attributes of an international open data regime and the processes required to ensure that it operates to maximise the creativity and productivity of national and international science systems. Such a concordat will be endorsed by Science International and be promoted by its partners.

The essential contribution of Science International should be to ensure that the capacity to work effectively in an open data/big data environment is not only embedded in countries with a strongly funded research base but also in those in low and middle incomes.

The link to participate in the Webinar is:

http://www.icsu.org/events/scienceinternationalworkinggroup/plominoform.2015-09-23.7597831651/view