Scidev.net launched

28 November 2001

The website, known as SciDev.Net, has been created on the premise that those who stand to benefit most from modern science and technology tend to be those who have least access to information about either, leaving them ill-equipped to take part in discussions about issues that profoundly affect their lives.

Free-access website to provide news, views and
information on science, technology and development

The first global website dedicated to both reporting on and discussing the role of science and technology in meeting the needs of developing countries will be launched in London on Monday, 3 December.

The website, known as SciDev.Net, has been created on the premise that those who stand to benefit most from modern science and technology tend to be those who have least access to information about either, leaving them ill-equipped to take part in discussions about issues that profoundly affect their lives.

“The Internet provides an unprecedented opportunity to address this dilemma, and thus help to bridge the divide that separates the ‘knowledge-rich’ from ‘knowledge-poor’ nations of the world,” says David Dickson, formerly news editor of Nature and the founding director of SciDev.Net.

“We hope that this website will therefore make a fundamental contribution both to the creation of knowledge-based development strategies, and to informed debate about the directions in which these strategies should lead.”

In order to achieve this goal, SciDev.Net, which can be accessed at www.scidev.net, aims to provide a focal point for both authoritative information and informed debate about issues such as climate change, human cloning and intellectual property.

Its broad objective is to help empower individuals, communities and decision-makers in developing countries, in particular by increasing their ability to ensure the effective contribution of science and technology to public health and economic well-being in an environmentally sustainable way.

The website is backed by the world’s two leading scientific journals, Nature and Science. Each has agreed to provide free access to a selected number of items from each week’s issue (full access to items in these publications is usually restricted to paying subscribers).

In addition to these journals - from which SciDev.Net will be both financially and editorially independent - the project is also supported by the Third World Academy of Sciences, which brings together more than 80 scientific academies from across the developing world.

“Publishers and journals have tended to be unimaginative in their thinking about the developing world,” says Philip Campbell, the editor of Nature. “In SciDev.Net, we have an original and well funded initiative to help scientists and others in the developing world get hold of information and opinion about things that really matter to them. I'm very pleased that Nature has been able to help this get off the ground, and will look forward to contributing to SciDev.Net alongside Science and other publications.”

“We at Science are pleased to join forces with our colleagues at Nature in sponsoring SciDev.Net,” says Donald Kennedy, the editor of Science and formerly president of Stanford University in California. “Information about new findings is even more important to scientists in the developing world than to most of our subscribers, and we think this effort will help meet a real need.”

The intended audience for SciDev.Net includes anyone with a professional or personal interest in the contribution of science and technology to development. These range from laboratory researchers to science journalists, students, teachers, librarians, aid agency officials, and government decision-makers.

Financial support has been provided by the UK Department for International Development (which also funded the planning phase of the website), the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, and the International Development Research Centre in Canada.

An integral part of the website will be a series of ‘dossiers’. These will bring together various types of material - ranging from short news items and opinion articles to authoritative ‘policy briefs’ - on key topics at the interface between science, technology and society, with a particular focus on the relevance of these topics to developing countries.

Presenting a diverse range of information and substantial opportunities for feedback will, it is hoped, encourage web-based discussion on some of the contentious science and technology and society issues of the day. In addition, a network of correspondents in developing countries will bring news about scientific and technological developments in the South to a global audience.

“We hope that SciDev.Net will serve as a broker between those that have knowledge about science, technology and development, and those who can benefit from this knowledge,” says Geoff Oldham, formerly director of the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex, and chairman of the website’s board of trustees.

“We also hope that, through its network of southern based correspondents, its policy briefing service, and its web-based debates, SciDev.Net will become a voice for the South. Such a voice is urgently needed in the international debates on a wide range of science, technology and development issues cutting across health, agriculture, environment and industry.”

The official launch of the website will take place immediately following the first meeting of its board of trustees on Monday 3 December. In line with a commitment to represent a developing world perspective, the majority of trustees come from Southern countries (three from Sub-Saharan Africa, two from India, two from Latin America and one from China).

In addition to operating the website, SciDev.Net hopes eventually to become engaged in a range of activities aimed at integrating ideas about science and technology into the cultural fabric of developing societies. The trustees meeting, for example, will be followed by a half-day workshop on ‘Science, Communication and Development’ in which several of Britain’s leading experts on the communication of science will discuss the relevance of UK experience to the challenges facing science communicators in the developing world.

“Through its website and other related activities, SciDev.Net hopes to place itself in the vanguard of new web-based approaches to promoting the application of science and technology to human well-being and sustainable development,” says Oldham.

To find out more about SciDev.Net, or to register to receive regular e-mail alerts that will inform you of new material added to the site each week, please visit: www.scidev.net.

Further Information

SciDev.Net is an independent not-for profit company, registered under UK law as a ‘company limited by guarantee’, and has applied for registration as a charity.

If you would like more information about the company or its website, which has been designed by the London-based company Synergy New Media, please send an e-mail to [email protected].

Main contacts:
David Dickson on [email protected] (telephone: +44 (0) 20 7291 3691)
Professor Geoff Oldham on [email protected] (telephone: +44 (0) 1323 896535).
Danny Schaffer (Third World Academy of Sciences) on [email protected] (+39.040.224.0538)

The Trustees of SciDev.Net:
Fred Binka, School of Public Health, University of Ghana
Philip Campbell, Editor, Nature
Louk de la Rive Box, Professor of International Co-operation, Maastricht University, The Netherlands
Mohamed Hassan, Executive director, Third World Academy of Sciences, Trieste, Italy
Donald Kennedy, Editor, Science
Lan Xue, Director, Development Research Academy Institute for the 21st Century, Tsinghua University, Beijing
Lydia Makhubu, Vice-chancellor, University of Swaziland
R. A. Mashelkar, Director, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi, India
Sunita Narain, Director, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi, India
Geoffrey Oldham (Chair), Former director, Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex
Abel Packer, Director, Latin American and Caribbean Centre on Health Science Information (BIREME), Sao Paulo, Brazil
Hebe Vessuri, Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research (IVIC), Caracas, Venezuela
Anne Whyte, President, Mestor Associates, Ontario, Canada

Note to London-based journalists:

If you would like to attend the launch reception in London next Monday evening (3 December), please contact [email protected] or telephone Karen Levin on +44 (0) 20 7291 3690.