GO FAIR

The GO FAIR Initiative

In 2016, the European Commission published the concept of a European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).

The GO FAIR Initiative aims to implement the FAIR DATA principles and to make research data findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable

The FAIR principles formulate the basic principles needed to maximise the sustainable reusability of data. FAIR stands for Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable. Their implementation ensures that data can be accessed and used across disciplinary and national boundaries.

Findable (Meta)data can be easily found by humans and machines. Metadata in particular simplify the search for relevant datasets.

Accessible Clearly defined licensing and access protocols ensure that (meta)data can be retrieved, whenever possible in Open Access.

Interoperable Humans and machines can use and process datasets.

Reusable Data and metadata are sufficiently well described for both humans and computers, so that they can be replicated or combined by computer-aided methods in future research.

The three-point FAIRification Framework offers a basic definition for every principle, examples and links to useful resources.

Global challenges require global solutions that ideally are FAIR. A number of initiatives are working on this globally. The advantages of digital change have brought a quick development of research infrastructures. Science systems are investing more and more in national or regional Open Science Clouds and in platforms supporting scholarly work holistically. They aim to remove barriers between disciplines and to enable cross-disciplinary collaboration.

The science system now faces the task of bundling the global engagement and converging the clouds and platforms.

Since 2017, the GO FAIR Initiative has been advocating the sharing and understanding of research data and promoting the FAIR Principles. The FAIR Principles also play an important role in the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI). Linkage and exchange, supporting convergence, the reusability of solutions and the adoption of the FAIR Principles in the infrastructure landscape (e.g. European Open Science Cloud, NFDI) are particularly important to the GO FAIR Initiative.

The GO FAIR Initiative was created originally by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Education Ministries of France and the Netherlands. Funding by the BMBF ended in 2021.

Several international GO FAIR Offices, such as the one at the ZBW, now carry on the work of coordination and support the scientific community in their needs. It remains the goal of the GO FAIR Initiative to foster a global culture of dialogue and cooperation and to make qualified knowledge and solutions visible.

The foundation for the GO FAIR collaboration has been laid. The building of a global infrastructure and network needs time. The most important thing, however, is the vision for research, science and society. It is important for the ZBW to follow the processes, to explore new paths and to initiate a dialogue with international partners.