Virtual SciDataCon 2021 is organised around a number of thematic strands. This is the second of a series of announcements presenting these strands to the global data community. Please note that registration is free, but participants must register for each session they wish to attend.
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) lay out ambitious targets to address major global challenges. They require significant data gathering and integration, not only for official reporting but also to support the science around each of the SDGs. The SDGs and DRR are among the most pressing drivers for the application of Open Science and FAIR data: to support the science needed to monitor, critique and achieve these targets.
Unsurprisingly, therefore, sessions dealing with data for the SDGs, for DRR and for other closely related topics feature heavily in the Virtual SciDataCon programme.
Harnessing risk-based data for disaster and climate resilience, Wednesday 20 October, 07:00-08:30 UTC: REGISTER
Data plays acrucial role in addressing a broad spectrum of challenges for improving risk reduction and sustainable development. Data standardisation, interoperability,availability, veracity, and accessibility are crucial techniques to address arange of vulnerability factors acting at the macro (i.e., national) andcommunity levels. For instance, standardisation of loss data quantification can assist in identifying gaps in vulnerability or risk assessment and simultaneously improving risk information. Likewise, accessing under-utilisedor unexplored data or data sources could be a valuable resource for assessingvulnerabilities and helping develop adaptive capacity. The session will discuss the mechanisms and methods on how data could be made accessible, available, interoperable, and standardised for climate and disaster risk assessment and a Systematic approach to ensure data coherence.
Accelerating South-South Cooperation to unlock the value of data for development, Wednesday 20 October, 11:00-12:30 UTC: REGISTER
South-South Cooperation (SSC) is critical to fuel technological innovation to advance the Data for Development (D4D) agenda and progress towards the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. However, it is broadly acknowledged that SSC modalities for harnessing innovations in data for development remain under-developed. To overcome this deficit, there is a need for more documentation, discussion, and diffusion of lessons learned to spur fruitful South-South and Triangular data collaborations. The Thematic Research Experts Network for Data and Statistics (SDSN/TReNDS), established in 2015, is global in reach with an objective to leverage knowledge from both the Global North and South to put innovative data sources to work for development. This session would draw from TReNDS members’ direct experience in South-South and Triangular Cooperation processes with the aim of distilling lessons learned and sparking a broader conversation with SciDataCon participants about accelerating more fruitful data collaborations.
From Sendai to Send Data: Using Hazard Information Profile Data to understand the impact of hazards, Wednesday 20 October, 13:00 – 14:30 UTC: REGISTER
With disasters increasing in intensity, severity and impacts across the globe, improving risk information across all types of hazards is critical to enhance our capacity to anticipate, prevent and respond to disaster risks from the local to the global scales. One barrier to sharing and using risk information effectively has been the lack of standardized definitions of hazards and a lack of guidance on the full range of hazards from hydrometeorological, extraterrestrial, geological, environmental, chemical, biological, technological and societal that need to be addressed in risk management. Through the
Collaborative Systems Modelling for Urban Health, Thursday 21 October, 07:00-08:30 UTC: REGISTER
Current planetary health conditions culminate and often also originate in cities. Cities are complex systems which have beneficial but also detrimental impacts on human health and wellbeing. Collaborative Systems Modelling (CSM) can help better understand those complex relations and can provide decision support for urban planners, decision-makers and citizens on how to plan, manage and make use of urban green spaces. The ISC Programme for Urban Health and Wellbeing has been exploring a Data-Knowledge-Action
Sharing Population Data for Infectious Disease Research in Africa, Thursday 21 October, 16:00-17:30 UTC: REGI
This panel will report on activity in African projects around the sharing of population data coming from HDSS sites and other sources, including the integration of such data with clinical sources. Several major developments in this area have occurred, and ongoing projects have continued to evolve. Built on the foundations of the IMDEPTH and subsequent ALPHA Networks, INSPIRE has pushed forward in prototyping a data-sharing platform based on OMOP. The INSPIRE PEACH project is now building analysis tools on top of this platform in Kenya and Malawi. This initial work was presented at the International FAIR Convergence Symposium in December 2020, and further developments in this work are discussed. A major new effort in this space is also taking shape in the form of the African Population Cohort Consortium (APCC). This panel will present a high-level view of these developments, and explore some specific topics of interest within this frame.
Making Open Data Work for Small Scale Farmers: A Case for Developing Countries, Friday 22 October, 11:00-12:30 UTC: REGISTER
Developing countries need to mainstream open data for smart and sustainable development in various fields. Mainstreaming open data in agriculture sector can be achieved through linking agricultural research databases, fostering data sharing, management and interoperability in agricultural research projects/programmes. Data sharing and innovation has the potential to promote learning, improve the sustainability and create impact on household nutrition and food security. The session will feature a set of short ignition talks on the theme: How can research organizations and academia make agricultural research open data work for farmers in developing countries? Case studies include the following: 1) the Pest Risk Information Service (PRISE) which uses cutting-edge geospatial infrastructure and state-of-the-art algorithms to deliver solutions to reduce crop losses caused by pests across six sub-Saharan African countries; 2) The Kenya Agricultural observatory platform (KAOP) which gives agricultural institutions access to high resolution geospatial agro-meteorological data to help policy makers and farmers optimize their decision making.
Fishing from an ocean of data to foster the development of a knowledgeable and ocean friendly society, Monday 25 October, 11:00-12:30 UTC: REGISTER
An interactive workshop: The goal of the workshop is to explore the role of researchers and citizens in supporting community led action on marine sustainability, marine pollution, climate action, and community resilience through engagement and outreach. Co-designed in collaboration with European partners and community representatives, the workshop will explore opportunities and challenges in communication of scientific information to general public. A series of short introductions from the panel (including live links and/or recorded video messages from community groups) will precede group work on creation of dedicated ocean related actions to promote effective transfer of ocean related knowledge to citizens.
Data Science and Systems Analysis, Monday 25 October, 13:00-14:30 UTC: REGISTER
Systems analysis is applicable to a wide variety of problems facing our planet. Its many applications are spurred by the dramatic amount of data available and the remarkable new tools for using data to make better decisions and influence policy. This session will explore the interplay between data science/data analysis and systems analysis by focusing on complex socio-technological systems involving interactions of people and man-made devices with the natural environment, and specifically examining the challenges posed by destructive impacts from changing climates, droughts and floods, earthquakes, and other natural events, as well as by human activities including technological catastrophes, acts of terror, and cyberattacks. The world-wide COVID-19 pandemic illustrates the vulnerability of our human and economic systems, challenging the ability of our healthcare system to provide needed services, the resilience of our supply chains to provide needed goods, and the ability of our social infrastructure to provide for economic well-being– all examples of issues that systems analysts address. We will explore the use of advanced approaches of Big Data collection and deep analytical processing to explore these problems of systems analysis.
Data Together Activities Evaluating Landscape Mapping concepts for the SDGs, Monday 25 October, 16:00-17:30 UTC: REGISTER
This session will explore the Data Together (CODATA, GO FAIR, RDA, WDS) organisations’ respective activities in relation to data for the SDGs. Given their commitment to open data science and the FAIR Principles, each organization can contribute to the availability of data, data management and re-use of data. Collectively they contribute to the broader global call for SDG data and as a group, they can synergize their impact for future SDG evaluations. In addition to identifying collective strengths and opportunities for collaboration, this session will identify challenges in facilitating the use of data and data science towards assessing and achieving the SDGs. Important topics for discussion include the role of data repositories, the necessary data granularity, data integration and
Virtual SciDataCon 2021 is organised by CODATA and the World Data System, the two data organisations of the International Science Council – PROGRAMME AT A GLANCE – FULL PROGRAMME – please note that registration is free, but participants must register for each session they wish to attend.