“Interoperability and interdisciplinarity in support of GEOSS” - Ispra, Italy - June 30th to July 2nd, 2009

This workshop was hosted and led by the Joint Research Centre (JRC, Italy) and the Institute of Resource Assessment (IRA, Tanzania).

The role of Work Package 5 is to highlight the need to combine the geoscience information provided by AEGOS, with information on soils, surface water, agriculture, forest, natural habitats, and others needed to address important problems faced by the African continent. The “ Global Earth Observations System of Systems” (GEOSS) approach should be demonstrated by linking up existing data sources through protocols that promote interoperability and interdisciplinarity with societal Benefit Aeras.

The workshop started with a number of information sessions on available data, INSPIRE, and possible scenarios. A brainstorming session in order to identify possible test case areas followed. The session resulted in a list of relevant data sources, like the JRC SOIL database, the JRC Biodiversity database, the Tanzania Natural Resources Information Centre (TANRIC) database from IRA, the World Soil Survey and Catalogue (WOSSAC), and the West African Exploration Initiative (WAXI). These data sources can be used in the development of scenarios that deal with soil organic matter, biodiversity and nature wildlife protection, and hydrogeology. Developing these scenarios will give input to the “Guidelines of best practice on standards and protocols used for intero-perability and interdisciplinarity in support of GEOSS”, which is one of the deliverables of WP5. A number of on-line services disclosing the different data sources will be developed and demonstrated during the mid-term conference in May 2010.