This article was originally posted on ASREN’s website.
Trieste, Italy, 16 June 2022 – After rounds of discussions and extensive technical evaluation sessions, LA Referencia/RedCLARA, the Latin American Cooperation of Advanced Networks, and ASREN, the Arab States Research and Education Network, have signed an agreement within the framework fostered by COAR, the Confederation of Open Access Repositories and the LIBSENSE Initiative, for ongoing information and infrastructure sharing between the two organisations.
The collaboration involves adopting the LA Referencia open-source discovery software by ASREN, which will launch a regional platform for harvesting, validation, enrichment and publication of metadata of scientific production in the Arab region, raising the visibility of Arabic content locally and internationally. ASREN will share the experience with the other African networks through the EU co-funded AfricaConnect3 project and the LIBSENSE Initiative, potentially leading to similar research discovery portals that further open access and open science in Africa.
“This agreement offers a great opportunity to share our experiences in Latin America and work together with ASREN and the other African networks to help improve the visibility of Arabic and African content. We look forward to learning from ASREN and improving our open platform for the benefit of all its users.” said Lautaro Matas, Executive and Technical Director, LA Referencia.
Yousef Torman, Managing Director, ASREN says: “This agreement brings us closer to achieving sustainable open science in the Arab region and Africa and supports greater discoverability of Arabic content. We look forward to continuing working with LA Referencia/RedCLARA for the mutual benefit of our communities.”
In the coming months, ASREN will launch its version of the LA Referencia harvester and begin to aggregate content from repositories and other content providers in the region.
