international year of soils

15 Jan 2015
Groups audience: 

Hey Ag team,

I just learned (rather belatedly) that 2015 is the international Year of Soils (http://www.fao.org/soils-2015/en/). Apparently as part of this, they want to establish a global soils information system. As the lead data manager for the International Polar Year a while back, I know how hard this is to do. Perhaps it is something this IG wants to assist with.

Just a thought.

cheers,
 

 

-m. 
  • Vassilis Protonotarios's picture

    Author: Vassilis Proton...

    Date: 15 Jan, 2015

    Dear Mark,
    Thank you for the heads-up; even though my views do not necessarily
    reflect the ones of the group, indeed it seems that such an activity
    would be of high interest to the group. It would be really interesting
    to see e.g. how the work of the Wheat Data Interoperability Working
    Group related to the Wheat Information System
    (http://www.wheatinitiative.org/research/wis) could be applied in the
    case of soil data. Building on that, we could move things forward using
    existing standards, inviting experts and working collaboratively. This
    could also highlight the need for a Soil Data Interoperability Working
    Group, to be organized and provide results within the year (if possible).
    Please feel free to share with us any related resources from the Polar
    Year data-related work, as they could also be helpful.
    Warm regards,
    Vassilis
    /*Vassilis Protonotarios, PhD|* Marketing & Networks Manager /
    /*Agro-Know*/
    /Email: ***@***.*** /
    /Website:www.agroknow.gr /
    /Tel: +30 210 6897 905/
    /Fax: +30 210 6891 961/
    /Address:17 Grammou Str., Vrilissia GR15235, Greece/
    Agro-Know is an extraordinary company that captures, organizes and adds
    value to the rich information available in agricultural and biodiversity
    sciences, in order to make it universally accessible, useful and meaningful.
    Check out our blog : blog.agro-know.com

  • Lance McKee's picture

    Author: Lance McKee

    Date: 15 Jan, 2015

    Vassilis,
    I encourage you and your international colleagues to look into using the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) (http://www.opengeospatial.org) to advance your cause of using existing standards to develop an international standard for encoding soils data.
    A small group of hydrological informatics leaders from Australia, Europe and US worked within the OGC to create WaterML 2.0 (http://www.opengeospatial.org/standards/waterml), now a recognized international encoding standard for hydrological data. You could do this for soils data.
    Lance
    Lance McKee
    Senior Staff Writer
    Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)
    phone: +1 508-752-0108
    cell: +1 508-868-2295
    ***@***.***
    The OGC: Making location count...
    http://www.opengeospatial.org/contact

  • Simon Cox's picture

    Author: Simon Cox

    Date: 15 Jan, 2015

    Some of the same people who worked on WaterML at CSIRO, and Landcare Research NZ, are already engaged in soils data standardization through the OGC Agriculture DWG https://portal.opengeospatial.org/?m=projects&a=view&project_id=472 (OGC member's portal).
    For publicly visible documentation and also some services, follow these links:
    https://www.google.com.au/webhp?q=ANZSoilML#q=ANZSoilML
    Simon
    From: lmckee=***@***.***-groups.org [mailto:***@***.***-groups.org] On Behalf Of Lance McKee
    Sent: Friday, 16 January 2015 1:03 AM
    To: vprot; Agriculture Data Interest Group (IGAD)
    Cc: Mark Parsons
    Subject: Re: [rda-agrdatainterop-ig] international year of soils
    Vassilis,
    I encourage you and your international colleagues to look into using the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) (http://www.opengeospatial.org) to advance your cause of using existing standards to develop an international standard for encoding soils data.
    A small group of hydrological informatics leaders from Australia, Europe and US worked within the OGC to create WaterML 2.0 (http://www.opengeospatial.org/standards/waterml), now a recognized international encoding standard for hydrological data. You could do this for soils data.
    Lance
    Lance McKee
    Senior Staff Writer
    Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC)
    phone: +1 508-752-0108
    cell: +1 508-868-2295
    ***@***.***
    The OGC: Making location count...
    http://www.opengeospatial.org/contact
    On Jan 15, 2015, at 4:05 AM, vprot <***@***.***> wrote:
    Dear Mark,
    Thank you for the heads-up; even though my views do not necessarily reflect the ones of the group, indeed it seems that such an activity would be of high interest to the group. It would be really interesting to see e.g. how the work of the Wheat Data Interoperability Working Group related to the Wheat Information System (http://www.wheatinitiative.org/research/wis) could be applied in the case of soil data. Building on that, we could move things forward using existing standards, inviting experts and working collaboratively. This could also highlight the need for a Soil Data Interoperability Working Group, to be organized and provide results within the year (if possible).
    Please feel free to share with us any related resources from the Polar Year data-related work, as they could also be helpful.
    Warm regards,
    Vassilis
    Vassilis Protonotarios, PhD| Marketing & Networks Manager
    Agro-Know
    Email: ***@***.***
    Website:www.agroknow.gr
    Tel: +30 210 6897 905
    Fax: +30 210 6891 961
    Address:17 Grammou Str., Vrilissia GR15235, Greece
    Agro-Know is an extraordinary company that captures, organizes and adds value to the rich information available in agricultural and biodiversity sciences, in order to make it universally accessible, useful and meaningful.
    Check out our blog : blog.agro-know.com
    On 15/01/2015 04:06, Mark Parsons wrote:
    Hey Ag team,
    I just learned (rather belatedly) that 2015 is the international Year of Soils (http://www.fao.org/soils-2015/en/). Apparently as part of this, they want to establish a global soils information system. As the lead data manager for the International Polar Year a while back, I know how hard this is to do. Perhaps it is something this IG wants to assist with.
    Just a thought.
    cheers,
    -m.
    --
    Full post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/group/agriculture-data-interest-group-igad/p...
    Manage my subscriptions: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist
    Stop emails for this post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist/unsubscribe/47013
    --
    Full post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/group/agriculture-data-interest-group-igad/p...
    Manage my subscriptions: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist
    Stop emails for this post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist/unsubscribe/47013

  • Mark Parsons's picture

    Author: Mark Parsons

    Date: 15 Jan, 2015

    Hi Vassilis,
    I’m not sure how much of the lessons of IPY apply to soils. IPY was much more interdisciplinary, but the two references below may be helpful.
    I do support the idea of building from OGC standards.
    cheers,
    -m.
    Parsons, Mark A., Taco de Bruin, Scott Tomlinson, Helen Campbell, Øystein Godøy, Julie LeClert, and IPY Data Policy and Management SubCommittee. 2011a. The state of polar data—the IPY experience. In Understanding Earth’s Polar Challenges: International Polar Year 2007-2008 . Ed. Igor Krupnik, Ian Allison, Robin Bell, Paul Cutler, David Hik, Jerónimo López-Martínez, Volker Rachold, Eduard Sarukhanian, and Colin Summerhayes. Edmonton, Canada: CCI Press. http://www.icsu.org/news-centre/publications/reports-and-reviews/ipy-sum... (accessed March 29, 2011).
    Parsons MA, Ø Godøy, E LeDrew, TF de Bruin, B Danis, S Tomlinson, and D Carlson. 2011b. A conceptual framework for managing very diverse data for complex interdisciplinary science. Journal of Information Science 37 (6): 555-569. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0165551511412705
    On Jan 15, 2015, at 1:04 AM, Vassilis Protonotarios <***@***.***> wrote:
    Dear Mark,
    Thank you for the heads-up; even though my views do not necessarily reflect the ones of the group, indeed it seems that such an activity would be of high interest to the group. It would be really interesting to see e.g. how the work of the Wheat Data Interoperability Working Group related to the Wheat Information System (http://www.wheatinitiative.org/research/wis) could be applied in the case of soil data. Building on that, we could move things forward using existing standards, inviting experts and working collaboratively. This could also highlight the need for a Soil Data Interoperability Working Group, to be organized and provide results within the year (if possible).
    Please feel free to share with us any related resources from the Polar Year data-related work, as they could also be helpful.
    Warm regards,
    Vassilis
    Vassilis Protonotarios, PhD| Marketing & Networks Manager
    Agro-Know
    Email: ***@***.***
    Website:www.agroknow.gr
    Tel: +30 210 6897 905
    Fax: +30 210 6891 961
    Address:17 Grammou Str., Vrilissia GR15235, Greece
    Agro-Know is an extraordinary company that captures, organizes and adds value to the rich information available in agricultural and biodiversity sciences, in order to make it universally accessible, useful and meaningful.
    Check out our blog : blog.agro-know.com
    On 15/01/2015 04:06, Mark Parsons wrote:
    Hey Ag team,
    I just learned (rather belatedly) that 2015 is the international Year of Soils (http://www.fao.org/soils-2015/en/). Apparently as part of this, they want to establish a global soils information system. As the lead data manager for the International Polar Year a while back, I know how hard this is to do. Perhaps it is something this IG wants to assist with.
    Just a thought.
    cheers,
    -m.
    --
    Full post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/group/agriculture-data-interest-group-igad/p...
    Manage my subscriptions: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist
    Stop emails for this post: https://www.rd-alliance.org/mailinglist/unsubscribe/47013

  • Vassilis Protonotarios's picture

    Author: Vassilis Proton...

    Date: 23 Jan, 2015

    Dear Mark and all,
    Thank you for your valuable feedback. As in any case, our intention
    would be to build on existing standards (and not re-invent the wheel)
    and hopefully provide the missing links and/or boost the ongoing work in
    this area.
    We will have to see how this new activity could be supported (and if
    there is enough interest from the stakeholders/community to support the
    development of a new WG) and act as soon as possible.
    Warm regards,
    Vassilis

submit a comment