GODAN is seeking a consultant to be the coordinating author of a 10 - 20 page think-piece report exploring issues of open data, data ownership and data governance in the context of agriculture and nutrition.

Advocacy for open data is generally predicated on the idea that opening up data brings a net benefit. However, it is important to consider how the costs and benefits of open data are distributed. Farmers groups have expressed concern about the exploitation of data collected from their land, without them receiving payment, having the ability to control how the data is used, or having capacity to use the data themselves to inform their own farming decisions.

Public and privately funded agricultural extension services are building large databases on farms and farmers, yet are unclear about what should or should not be made available as open data. Researchers and extension workers have tricky decisions to make about the balance of benefit when releasing real-time data on issues such as crop-pests, aware of the impacts such data may have on specific commodity trades.

Given these challenges, how can an idea of ‘open by default’ be promoted, whilst recognising the complex decisions that need to be made with respect to data ownership, privacy, use and the governance of shared and open data resources.

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