standardization of environmental data and information - International ...

model used at the British Museum of Natural History. Any number of other
good European and American biodiversity databases could be adapted for
this purpose, such as those mentioned in his paper. When looking into the
kinds of data to be included and the kinds of relationships that people
should be able to explore, the Authority should seek advice from consulting
companies that had created databases for other organizations.
Database management and development had become a specialized
and complex area of programming and software development, Rex
continued. Thus, it was important that the Authority have a group of highly
trained programmers to develop and manage the database on a continuing
basis. Since it would be electronic, its geographical location would make no
difference.
He favoured making the database available through a Web site,
though he realized that the developers had proprietary rights to the
chemistry of the nodules and that the Authority might wish to have rights to
all the data, some of which might understandably be held back for a time.
Nevertheless, he believed in having a site where the data would be
available to the businesses involved because, as time went by and data
accumulated, it should be possible to design sampling programmes that
were more efficient and less expensive. For the public, the scientific
community and policy makers, the Web site could be a useful vehicle for
bringing their various interests together.
Concerning the centralization of taxonomic resources, he thought it
important to standardize the quality of taxonomy by having individuals who
knew groups well do all the taxonomy. This would avoid situations in which,
for example, different taxonomists designated the same populations as one
species here and three species there. Wherever these taxonomic resources
or archives resided, it would be desirable to relate them closely to
development of the database. In studies of ecology and taxonomy, for
example, it was often necessary to look at a collection to make sure of the
species. That became difficult if collections were in different locations.
Speaking of long-term benefits, Rex noted that the Authority’s aim
was to figure out how deep-sea resources could be mined by interested
businesses, how the process could be regulated and how environmental
assessment could be done. It was obviously not the responsibility of either
businesses or the Authority to develop deep-sea oceanography. However, a
database could offer tremendous long-term benefits. It could be a unique
source of information on the abyssal environment, representing a huge leap
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INTERNATIONAL SEABED AUTHORITY