Conservation Commons

This initiative supports a "knowledge commons" by using networking and cooperation to encourage organisations and individuals to work together to ensure open and fair data access and knowledge sharing on the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. The idea is that, by working together to effectively share information resources, the conservation community can achieve far more than through individual action. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are chief among the tools used to support this "global community of informed conservation practice" by connecting practitioners to data and information assets, as well as developing and adopt standards for integrating these assets to support the generation of knowledge and best practice on the conservation of biodiversity - for the benefit of the global conservation community and beyond.

Specifically, an interactive website is at the centre of Conservation Commons. Here, one may read (in English, French, Spanish) and/or sign on to an underlying set of Principles, which address the concerns raised in the intellectual property rights debate, and particularly traditional knowledge. In sum, the Principles include:

• Principle 1 - Open Access: The Conservation Commons promotes free and open access to data, information and knowledge for conservation purposes.
• Principle 2 - Mutual Benefit: The Conservation Commons welcomes and encourages participants to both use these resources and to contribute data, information and knowledge.
• Principle 3 - Rights and Responsibilities: Contributors to the Conservation Commons have full right to attribution for any use of their data, information, or knowledge, and the right to ensure that the original integrity of their contribution to the Commons is preserved. Users of the Conservation Commons are expected to comply, in good faith, with terms of uses specified by contributors...

In addition to endorsing these principles (click here for a list of organisations that have), one may access a variety of resources and types of background information, join online discussion groups, and/or contribute data and content.

In part through this web-based collaborative resource, organisers hope to create a growing community of organisations working together to put the values embodied in the Principles into practice. Along these lines, the main programmatic focus areas of the Conservation Commons are:

• Open geographic information systems (GIS) and remote sensing - the role of geo-referencing in the integration of data and information assets (a key focus is on local-level understanding)
• Institutional policies and guidelines for implementing open access - specific aspects of institutional culture, regulations, policies which may limit or impede open access
• Tools, protocols, and standards for developing common data and information sharing architecture
• Publications, grey literature, and conservation knowledge - tools and standards for "commons" repositories and digital libraries.

Environment, Rights.

"Environmental organisations...generally do not directly control or 'own' the biodiversity and natural resources they are seeking to conserve, and thus in most cases, cannot act directly to preserve these resources. The common mission of these organisations, rather, is to...generat[e] comprehensive data, expertise, and knowledge on the distribution, conservation, and sustainable use of biodiversity....Information, therefore, is arguably the most valuable contribution made by the environmental community towards the preservation of the web of life on this planet." (from: "A Global Environmental Knowledge Network", by Thomas Daniel Moritz and Tom Hammond, i4d Vol. III No. 8, August 2005 [PDF]).

In this context, a group of conservation organisations came together in 1995 to establish an institutional framework for data and information sharing, the Biodiversity Conservation Information System (BCIS). Several years after the conclusion of the BCIS initiative, a group of 48 representatives from 27 organisations met in May 2004 at The World Conservation Union (IUCN)'s Headquarters in Gland, Switzerland. Representatives included many of the original BCIS members, the scientific and research community, multilateral organisations, indigenous people, and the private sector. What emerged from the meeting was a consensus that the notion of a framework of free yet equitable use for data, information and knowledge resources (a zone of fair use) held great potential...in contrast to either closed/proprietary knowledge (which would run counter to the notion of digital information and data resources as "non-rivalrous" resources) or, on the other hand, an open access approach that would involve simply placing assets in the public domain (which would be vulnerable to the potential constraints of information resources created for scientific, educational, and related purposes be used for commercial gain).