Progress in science and technology can only be achieved by building upon a community knowledge base. This is as true for agricultural development as for anything else. However, current technical, financial, legal and cultural barriers can make it difficult to access and use existing agricultural knowledge. 

Open Knowledge initiatives that promote free, unrestricted access to research, data, software and learning materials promise to further accelerate agricultural development, reduce hunger and poverty, and improve food security in less economically developed countries.

The Open Knowledge in Agricultural Development (OKAD) article collection will be a platform for authors to share their original research findings, initiatives, case studies, perspectives and opinions relating to Open Knowledge initiatives within all areas in the context of agriculture, agri-food and agro-biodiversity. We encourage the submission of articles on topics including, but not limited to:

• E-infrastructure for agricultural development
• Publishing and communicating scientific knowledge
• Open access, open data and open educational resources
• Dissemination, metrics and impact assessment
• Development of open source software, applications and platforms
• Policy and socio-economic issues
• Non-digital Open Knowledge initiatives

More information at http://f1000research.com/article-collections/okad

Open up your knowledge and contribute to OKAD

Dates: The OKAD collection will be launched on February 23rd 2015 and will be open to contributions indefinitely. Authors who wish to have their articles published as part of the launch should submit their article by February 2nd 2015.

Discounts & waivers: All articles submitted before the launch date will be free to publish. Articles submitted after this date will receive a 20% discount off the standard article processing charge.

F1000Research welcomes a wide range of studies, including small research notes, null results, replications, refutations, traditional research articles, reviews, opinion pieces, method articles, and software tools (see our author guidelines for details about each article type).

In line with F1000Research's publication model, all articles submitted to this collection will be transparently reviewed by invited experts after publication; articles that pass peer review will become highly visible through indexing in major bibliographic databases.

If you have any questions, please email [email protected].