Access to science and knowledge is indispensable for a society that is more informed and more aware of the world it inhabits, contributing to making it more humane, fairer and more democratic and where well-being is shared by all.

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The implementation of Open Science involves the incorporation of methodologies, tools and practices of a collaborative nature and requires the commitment of the various agents involved in the production, dissemination and use of knowledge.

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Open Science does not only mean the selective sharing of data and publications, it represents the opening of the scientific process as a whole, reinforcing the concept of scientific social responsibility. Open Science comprises open access to research data and results and open innovation; contemplates the contexts of co-creation/production of knowledge in a growing involvement with society, encourages citizen science and is concerned with giving back to society the knowledge produced, always with full respect for intellectual property, in defense of good practices and transparency.

At the supranational level, institutions such as the European Union, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and UNESCO have taken the lead in defining and promoting Open Access, also constituting themselves as spaces for cooperation and coordination of the various national initiatives that have been developed .

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Within the scope of the European Union, this vision has been reflected in the development of legal instruments with an impact on encouraging the availability of scientific research results, such as the European Commission Recommendation on access to scientific information and its preservation (2012/417 /UE) as well as more recently Directive 2013/37/EU, of the European Parliament and of the European Council, of 26 June 2013, on the reuse of public sector information.

At an international level, several initiatives have been launched that seek to promote Open Access and Open Science. Several countries have made efforts to set up national open access / open science strategies with strong investment in training and infrastructure.

Added to this is the growing importance that digital technologies have brought to the production, dissemination and sharing of knowledge, involving the various sectors of society in an increasingly persistent and accelerated pace of development, enhancing the possibilities of accessing and enjoying knowledge in an increasingly that it is important to democratize in an Open Science environment.

The impacts that digital technologies, and digital culture in general, are causing are notorious, causing considerable changes in all types of societies and economies, emphasizing, from the outset, the impact and pressure that digital reality exerts on broad domains of learning, involving new ways of thinking, learning and communicating.

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The academic and scientific community is both generator and user of this new context of knowledge production and sharing, facing the need to establish and implement strategies conducive to creating and taking advantage of associated social and economic opportunities, namely by promoting means of organization, curatorship , preservation and access to information, promoting advanced forms of scientific computing and the intensive development of data sciences around the ability to handle and manage large amounts of information.

At the same time, awareness of the need to bring science/knowledge closer to society, the urgency of responding to increasingly complex social challenges, the indispensability of assuming a greater commitment in terms of scientific and social responsibility, as, from the outset, raises the enunciation of the 2030 Agenda and the ability to respond to and contribute to overcoming the 17 Challenges for Sustainable Development.

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The academic and scientific community certainly has a greater responsibility in creating opportunities, seeking solutions and finding answers towards sustainable development in economic, social and environmental terms, contributing to a fairer society with greater well-being.

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For countries that have Portuguese as an official language, sharing knowledge, in the context of Open Science and using the possibilities that digital technologies currently provide, constitutes an opportunity in terms of valuing and projecting scientific production in these geographies, reinforcing collaboration among themselves and the recognition of Science in Portuguese at the international level. It is also an opportunity to place knowledge at the service of development, particularly in the context of peoples who have Portuguese culture and language as their matrix reference.

A considerable part of the knowledge produced is already digital or is subject to and tends to be preserved as such, placing, in particular scientific and cultural institutions, growing demands and new challenges in terms of storage, preservation and curation of information, encouraging the development of a collective intelligence in information management (semantics, knowledge mapping, ontologies). The role and mission of digital repositories is reinforced and pressure is increased to respond to new opportunities and challenges. Due to their characteristics and ability to make content available, they are key tools with great potential to expand and democratize access to knowledge, make science and culture more global, and, in the case of Portuguese-speaking countries, the Portuguese language , contributing to greater visibility and recognition. Naturally, the impact of the contents made available in digital repositories will be greater if they are networked.

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Several science and culture institutions in Portuguese-speaking countries have built over the years digital repositories, which add content within their scope of action; for the most part, they exist in a dispersed form, without a coordinated effort having been developed to enhance their use.

Portugal has a mature and consolidated infrastructure around the RCAAP project – Scientific Open Access Repository of Portugal. RCAAP hosts 51 institutional repositories and 62 scientific journals. Currently, more than 350,000 documents are available on the RCAAP portal, in open access. A Directory of Digital Repositories was recently created, covering all Portuguese digital repositories in the areas of science and culture (http://repositorios-conhecimento.pt).

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Brazil stands out for the number of documents available on the OASIS.BR portal (Brazilian Portal of Scientific Publications in Open Access), which exceeds one million documents. Since 2009 Mozambique has had an infrastructure that aggregates digital repositories, SABER. In 2012, the Cape Verde Knowledge Portal was created and more recently, in 2015, the Repository of the National University of Timor Lorosae. These projects and infrastructures have had the technical and scientific support of the Foundation for Science and Technology and the University of Minho.

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The Open Science, Science in Portuguese meeting has the purpose of a joint reflection on the questions mentioned and, in particular, the objective of provoking the deepening of cooperation and stimulating the development of joint programs/projects between Portuguese and Brazilian institutions, taking advantage of existing resources. regarding digital repositories.

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The aim is to explore the possibility of developing a reference for accessing existing digital repositories in Brazil and Portugal and, globally, in Portuguese-speaking countries, assuming the need to identify and characterize the existing digital repositories in these countries; thus contributing to the dissemination and (re)use of its contents and to the promotion of technical standardization, interoperability and digital preservation practices.

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The meeting aims at valuing Science in Portuguese, promoting knowledge and creating conditions for sharing it among Portuguese-speaking countries, pursuing the aim of democratizing access to knowledge and expanding its enjoyment while respecting good practices and standards. Open Science principles.

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Existing contexts in Brazil and Portugal will be presented and discussed, in terms of institutional framework, political and strategic guidelines, networks and (infra)structures available, reflection will be made on the challenges and opportunities that arise in terms of updating and modernization of digital repositories and preservation of digital content information in general, some pilot projects developed using digital content in an open science environment will be presented, namely in the areas of public health and the environment and biodiversity.

 

Maria Fernanda Rollo

Secretary of State for Science, Technology and Higher Education