NI4OS-Europe - Building National Initiatives for Open Science to support EOSC Association

National Initiatives for Open Science in Europe – NI4OS Europe, aims to be a core contributor to the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) service portfolio, commit to EOSC governance and ensure inclusiveness on the European level for enabling global Open Science. 

To ensure the sustainability of this flagship initiative for Europe, it has to be built upon a solid governance and organisational framework on the national level. The development and deployment of models for National Open Science Cloud Initiatives (NOSCIs) in Southeastern Europe, covering aspects related to research, organization and sustainability, can contribute to the strategic and organizational coherence and complementarity at EU, national and institutional levels and, thus, to the success and sustainability of EOSC. Consequently, NI4OS-Europe proposes the setting up of National Open Science Cloud Initiatives (NOSCIs) in the region and positions this activity at the core of the project’s mission and objectives.

A NOSCI is envisaged as a coalition of national organizations that have a prominent role and interest in the Europe Open Science Cloud (EOSC). The main aim of NOSCI will be the promotion of synergies at national level, and the optimization/articulation of their participation to European and global challenges in this field of OSC, including the EOSC. National initiatives are envisaged to play a prominent role in Member States and Associated Countries and facilitate EOSC governance.

Work package 2 (WP2) drives the setting up of NOSCIs by:

  1. Preparing and actively facilitating the work of NI4OS-Europe partners, e.g. identified national Open Science stakeholders and recognized their needs and EOSC views (D2.1 NI4OS-Europe Stakeholder map, inventory, policy matrix).

  2. Producing tools necessary to foster the establishment of NOSCIs and guide their operations, e.g. developed a blueprint for setting up NOSCIs that both addresses governance issues and suggests possible workflows and indicators to further advancements (D2.2 NI4OS-Europe National OSC initiatives models).

  3. Providing tailored advice to NI4OS-Europe partners at all stages of the process, e.g. performed one-to-one interviews to address emerging questions and suggest next steps per use case and demands.

In the last week of January, WP2 organised a webinar to communicate to the NI4OS-Europe consortium about how the tools can be effectively used, what models are available for building NOSCIs based on good examples accruing from the interviews and how NOSCIs’ contribute to and strengthen links with the EOSC ecosystem. This WP2 webinar is especially important as it kicked off implementation actions towards NOSCIs and their uptake in the region, while recognizing socio economic diversity and Open Science maturity of countries, all to be treated on a “best case scenario”.

WP2 urges colleagues outside the NI4OS-Europe consortium to consult and use its outputs to build NOSCIs in their countries and regions. NOSCIs rely on collaborations between stakeholders and so is NI4OS-Europe consortium, which welcomes the exchange of experiences and know-how with interested parties.

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Read more:

NI4OS-Europe blogpost “National Open Science Cloud Initiatives: proposal for a Blueprint and EOSC interconnection

15 February 2021