How Science Addresses Developing World Issues

IntroductionDr Matthew Cockerill - BioMed Central

Knowledge as a weapon in the struggle against malaria in sub-Saharan AfricaDr Colin Sutherland - London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

The role of the media in tackling disease in the developing worldMr David Dickson - SciDev.Net

Building a generation of future environmentalists in developing countriesMr Jib Hagan - CARE Computers for Developing Countries

How open access research has been adopted in the developing worldMs Barbara Kirsop - Electronic Publishing Trust for Development

Outline of session

Sharing knowledge

Knowledge is power

“Many developing countries remain poor largely because they let the Industrial Revolution pass them by. They can ill afford to miss the information technology revolution.”

M. S. Swaminathan, “Father of the Green Revolution”

Digital divide or digital bridge?

Mobile phones in Africa

Source: African Mobile Factbook 2008

SMS messaging for trading

Increasing use of PDAs and mobile phone networks for data gathering

The founders of 03b Networks recently helped pioneer the first commercial 3G mobile and fibre-to-the-home networks in Rwanda

The company said the system will enable the spread of locally generated content and e-learning, encouraging social and economic growth in the developing world.

It aims to tap into booming mobile phone usage in the developing world

In what areas can increased access to knowledge help?

UN Millenium Development Goals

Reduce child mortality,Improve maternal health

Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases

Ensure environmental sustainability Develop a global partnership for

development

Who needs access to the results of research?

Public

Professionals

Researchers

What is open access publishing?

Traditional journals– take ownership of the research– provide access to subscribers only

Open access journals– have no subscription barriers– take advantage of the economics of the

internet to allow universal access– research is openly licensed to allow reuse

Who pays?

Open access journals do have costs Publication fee is a very small fraction

of the cost of doing research Most open access publishers, including

BioMed Central, give waivers to developing countries

In other cases, open access journals have central support, so no charges for authors or readers

About BioMed Central

Pioneer of open access model Launched first journals in 2000 Now publish >180 OA titles >40,000 peer-reviewed OA articles

published All research articles published under

Creative Commons licence. Reuse and redistribution is encouraged.

Research on global health issues is expanding

Resources channeled into research on developing world health issues have increased significantly in recent years

A direct and an indirect result of philanthropic initiatives

Why use is the research if the people it is most relevant to

don’t have access?

US National Institutes of Health Howard Hughes Medical Institute Wellcome Trust Medical Research Council European Research Council EC Seventh Framework Program

Funders are now requiring open access

Open Access in practice

Repositories of open content

Open Access journals

Malaria Journal home page

A highly accessed Malaria Journal article

10,000+ downloads

22 citations

Where are papers on malaria published ?

020406080

100120140160180

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Year

Art

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Am J Trop Med Hyg

Trop Med Int Health

Mol Biochem Parasitol

Trans R Soc Trop Med

Infect Immunity

Parasitol Today/Trends

How accessible is malaria research as a whole?

Looking at the biomedical literature, around 9% of articles are immediately “open access”

18 months ago it was 6%

For malaria research it has been rapidly increasing and is now 27%!

Other tropical diseases….

The latest open access research on global health issues

A knowledge commons

Malaria Journal’s author-base is geographically diverse

Local journals are going global via Open Access

Stories from the developing world

The benefits of open access for the developing world

Zambia

Nigeria

The Gambia