GOOS Product Delivery System
The following document was presented to the 3rd Session of the GOOS Steering Committee by Francis Bretherton (fbretherton@ssec.wisc.edu).

The Integrated Global Observing Strategy (IGOS) is concerned with sustained measurements of the environment that are applied to issues of international concern. It envisages the evolutionary development of several related observing systems, each organized within a coherent theme and responsive to a variety of end uses of overall economic benefit and improved scientific understanding. The diagram below is intended to stimulate discussion of appropriate roles of the public and private sectors in the implementation of this concept.

Within the USA, there is a reasonably settled consensus that the taxpayer benefits most if the results of government-funded data collection are available to the general public as widely as possible, free of copyright or other restrictions and to everyone without discrimination. At the same time, as environmental information becomes more valued, commercial interests want to be involved, with distribution rights on data and derived products a prime concern. Particularly problematic are government-private partnerships, in which individually negotiated agreements over data rights can have many unforeseen consequences. In some other countries government agencies themselves are expected to cover a significant fraction of their costs by selling data and services as if they were a commercial business. These differences among nations are currently exacerbated by the Internet and the globalization of the economy, as well as by recurring fears of economic or military domination. Successful international collaboration depends upon voluntary adherence to a common vision of obligations and expectations, which minimizes the intrusion of these factors.

Many people have freely contributed ideas to development of this concept and the associated graphic. This material may be used freely and without restriction, subject only to a request to honor the spirit in which it is presented.

Key Points

·     Environmental observation in the public interest requires the growing several "trees", each with multiple uses around a distinct theme and co-ordinated with other "trees" where necessary. A well-developed example is the system for daily weather prediction.

·     For credibility, each trunk must be a responsibility of the public sector, with open scrutiny and assessment of data and synthesized products by the international scientific community.

·     Branches imply further distribution or processing. Mature branches - application areas for which the synthesized data products are well understood - are potential candidates for value-added privatization, provided the basic scientific data and core products remain available at marginal cost of reproduction. Where the science is not yet mature, investment in system development should be particularly responsive to research applications.

·     Individual roots are potential candidates for data buys from private companies, provided the public sector acquires all rights to further distribution and use of the data and government-sponsored derived products. Where a root serves more than one trunk, close liaison between those trunks is essential. Thus the whole may actually resemble a Banyan tree.

·     The incentive to participate in collaborative international science based observing programmes is the sharing of information. This requires free and unrestricted exchange of appropriate data and products at minimal cost to the scientific user. Data subject to use restriction should not be regarded as contributing to the Global Observing System.

·     Building capacity and enhancement of environmental understanding enables all nations to participate, and thus fertilizes the entire enterprise.