THE DATA AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS PANEL
The Data and Information Systems Panel (DISP) was first convened in the fall of 1990, as a panel of the Canadian Global Change Program (CGCP), with the following terms of reference:
- provide advice to the CGCP Research Committee and Secretariat;
- stress the importance of data in all CGCP activities;
- encourage greater communication and cooperation with other CGCP research panels;
- examine Canada's role in archiving and disseminating data for international global change programs;
- examine issues related to the international exchange of data; and
- develop guidelines and standards for data and information systems to be used by CGCP research projects.
From its inception, the DISP included representatives not only from those disciplines generally associated with global change research, but also from the social sciences and data libraries and data archives. Early work by the DISP centred on inventorying Canadian data for global change research, with the objective of facilitating the identification of data that still needed to be collected. This led to the compilation of a Directory of Directories. With this inventory of existing inventories in progress, the DISP then turned its attention, in November 1990, to the definition of other issues besides that of data identification. Barriers to data access emerged as a central issue among the disciplines represented in the Panel. The issue was brought to a head by the release of the U.S. Bromley Principles. The present document is the result of the deliberations of a much reduced DISP working at the problem of reviewing and clarifying barriers to data access over the past four years.
As part of its mandate the Panel noted several objectives for this document:
- to heighten awareness of data issues and to promote debate on the best means of exploiting, sharing and preserving the important resource that data represent;
- to sensitize key federal policy-setting agencies, for example, Treasury Board, to the crucial importance of funding and supporting data management and data access activities in Canada in all sectors;
- in the context of the International Global Change Program, to examine the legislative and policy issues that affect Canada's ability to participate in the international arena; and
- to stimulate changes needed to enhance the climate for the fullest use of data resources.
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