AIMS

AIMS supports standards, technology and good practices for open access and open data in the agricultural domain. Its goal is to empower (agricultural) information management specialists all over the world in creating access to agricultural knowledge. AIMS does this in the following pillars:

• Information Management Resources
• Recommendations in Information & Data Management
• Community of Practice
• Capacity Development

AIMS is also a portal with information about and access to standards, technology and good practices.  It is also a forum for connecting information management workers worldwide and for discussing open access and open data. AIMS stands for collaboration and interoperability.

AIMS provides:

• advice on how to manage, disseminate, share and exchange agricultural  information;
• good practices on the use of metadata standards, technologies and vocabularies for the agricultural domain;
• a community of practice centred on interoperability, reusability and cooperation;
• development activities.

AIMS is part of CIARD, the global movement for open agricultural knowledge for development.

AIMS as a directory of resources in information management

Through the VEST Directory, AIMS becomes a reference portal to discover the vocabularies, technology and metadata sets used in the agricultural domain. For example, an institution seeking to start a digital repository can find how to do it, and who is working in similar areas on AIMS.

The VEST Directory is aligned with the CIARD RING, a directory of datasets and information services. Jointly via the AIMS platform, these two resources provide access to existing information resources and to the semantics that are necessary for enhancing interoperability of agricultural systems and repositories.

AIMS as a set of recommendations

AIMS plays a key role on the development and implementation of semantic technologies for enhancing the interoperability of agricultural information systems. A number of initiatives related to the Semantic Web are taking place within the AIMS community. These innovative experiences are meant to support those institutions that wish to consume and publish linked data as a means of sharing, and exchange agricultural research information in the context of new challenges to agriculture.

Recommendations and good practices on how to produce Linked Open Data are part of the core of AIMS:

• Indexing content by using widely-used vocabularies as AGROVOC, a subject vocabulary covering areas that include food, nutrition, agriculture, fisheries, forestry and environment, translated into 22 languages. AGROVOC is available as a linked data set published, aligned (linked) with several vocabularies.
• Encoding strategies for producing Linked Open Data for bibliographical data by the use of good practices like Meaningful Bibliographic Metadata (M2B) and LODE-BD Recommendations 2.0.
• Facilitating access to datasets through registration at CIARD RING which provides a directory to allow information providers to register their services and datasets. CIARD RING facilitates the discovery of sources of agriculture-related information across the world.

AIMS as a community of practice

AIMS provides an open and free space to exchange ideas, suggestions, questions, and solutions around the core areas of information management standards, technology and methodologies.

The AIMS community is made up of individuals interested in information management from around the world, with a variety of technical expertise. By registering on AIMS, they subscribe to the monthly newsletter and daily news by topic, participate in capacity building activities, and receive news and events. Users can share news and cases studies from their institutions through blogging and publishing sharing news on AIMS.

AIMS community members learn about information management resources, receive support on how to use them, connect with other community members, share experiences, and discover current trends in agricultural information management, participate and share posts on topics of interest to the community.

AIMS as a capacity development platform

AIMS engages in capacity development activities which seek to build the technical capacity of individuals and national/regional/international institutions to implement Open Access and Open Data projects in the agricultural domain in the following activities:

• Webinars@AIMS – are real-time, online events in form of short presentations where the speaker introduces a specific topic through slides delivered to participants who can interact by posting questions, all covered  in one hour.
• Trainings – AIMS provides expertise in the areas of (agricultural) information & data management. These can be in the form of lectures, e-learning cources or organized meetings, usually with a national or regional institution managing the logistics aspects of these meetings.
• Workshops – AIMS have organized over the years Agricultural Ontology Services (AOS) workshops to gather researchers and practitioners in the area of semantic-driven information management in agriculture. In this context, AIMS also collaborates in the organization of conferences and events related to AIMS topics with stakeholders worldwide.

AIMS supports Open Access and Open Data initiatives in Agriculture

AIMS provides support in standards, technologies and methodologies to open access to knowledge initiatives and to open data initiatives. In this regard AIMS becomes a reference point for the CIARD movement through the provision of Information Management Resources, Community of Practice and Capacity Development.