CODATA: Contributions, Challenges and Opportunities

Krishan Lal
National Physical Laboratory, New Delhi , India

I had the privilege of joining CODATA fraternity in early 1990s through the Task Group on Data Sources in Asia-Oceania (DSAO), after first invitation from its Chairperson Prof Tsumi. Through this association, contributions of scientists like Prof. Kotani and Prof. Osugi became well known. I had the background of working in multi-disciplinary fields: crystallography and materials science. However, the range and extent of fields covered under CODATA is far bigger and awe-inspiring. This was also the period of expansion of the activities of DSAO both subject-wise as well as in terms of membership. Initially its membership was limited to Japan , S. Korea , China but soon it included a majority of countries in the region with good scientific base. Several important areas of life sciences including bio-diversity, materials science, geo-sciences, were covered in these deliberations and proceedings of most of the initial meetings were published by CODATA through very dedicated efforts of Edgar Westrum and Yarao Hu. In Asia-pacific region CODATA has now deep roots with CODATA International Conferences being organized by China (this being the second one), Japan and India .

Each Executive Board has tried to reinvent CODATA keeping in view the developments in different areas of science at that particular point of time and the opportunities available to contribute in an effective manner. The leadership, particularly the Presidents had been making a lot of efforts. I had the privilege of working with Prof. Dubois, Dr. John Rumble and Prof. Shuichi Iwata. Their leadership has imparted fresh vision, and energy.

In the recent past CODATA was deeply involved in globally visible important activities like the World Summit on Information Society organized by UNO. Also, a serious Priority Area Assessment by ICSU had taken place about which detailed deliberations took place during the last General Assembly at Berlin in 2004.

A large number of publications have been to the credit of this organization. Currently the Data Science Journal is published electronically. Outstanding contributions in data science are being recognized by the biennial CODATA Prize. Canadian National Committee has shown initiative to sponsor young researchers to CODATA International Conference.

Future is full of challenges. CODATA has the potential to serve with other organizations as a vehicle of development in the least developed regions, particularly in increasing the quality and spread of education. Also, there is a great scope in integrating traditional knowledge base with the main stream in a transparent ethical manner.