However, we do have a specific task before us, so I’d like to take a few minutes to outline what we hope to accomplish over the next two and a half days.  Plans for this symposium were initiated in response to a general concern–sharing the metadata expertise of the library and abstracting and indexing community with the biological information management community–and a specific opportunity–responding to the recommendations of the report of the President’s Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).

Today's rapidly evolving information technology supports increasing accessibility of a variety of information resources, which can contribute to the quality of biodiversity and ecosystem science and decision-making.  In addition to traditional journal literature and associated abstracting and indexing services, these information resources include– among others–primary data, maps and other visual representations of data, museum specimens, multimedia objects including digital audio and video segments, and software for analysis and modeling.  While this wealth of information awaits us, we currently don’t have the tools to locate, explore, and exploit these resources effectively.  Various agencies, universities, and communities are pursuing ways of making these resources available, but too often they are going their separate ways toward the same end.

The federal government is no exception to this "separate way" approach.  According to a recent report by the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology and Government:

"The government's environmental R&D system is excessively fragmented among numerous agencies and jurisdictions, and ... this fragmentation is a severe obstacle to developing the scientific information base necessary for effective protection of the nation's environment."

Clearly, an integrated approach to information management is warranted.
 
The indexing, classification, and cataloging generally implied by the relatively new term "metadata" are not new ideas; rather, they represent techniques that bibliographic database producers have developed and deployed over the past 25 to 30 years, and they’re founded in traditions for cataloging printed materials that date back even earlier.  The National Federation of Abstracting and Information Services (NFAIS) and USGS, then, began planning this symposium to bring the cataloging, indexing, and abstracting communities together with the various sectors of the biological sciences community currently wrestling with the problems of describing information resources in order to increase accessibility.  The science community, we envisioned, would benefit from the "been there, done that" experiences of the cataloging community, and in turn the cataloging community would benefit from a better understanding of the needs of a community whose information resources are not primarily bibliographic.

During the planning for this symposium, however, an opportunity arose with the release of the PCAST report to leverage the deliberations of this august gathering to address not only the concerns of our own communities but those of the greater community addressed in the report.  The report of the PCAST Panel on Biodiversity and Ecosystems recommends to the Administration that leading-edge information science and technologies be applied to electronically organize, interlink, and deliver biological information for use by all sectors of society.  While our general concern with sharing metadata expertise among our various communities provided an incentive to meet and collaborate, the PCAST report provided the Grand Challenge that has become a specific focus for this meeting.

The report states:

"It is becoming more and more important that we actively conserve biodiversity and protect natural ecosystems in order to preserve the quality of human life.  We propose that this can be done by enhancing understanding of the interdependence of the economy and the environment."

The report goes on to state that to achieve this understanding, the United States must utilize its scientific knowledge in its conservation strategies, and incorporate new knowledge into these strategies as that knowledge is generated.  In addition, because the strength of our own economy is linked inextricably to that of the world economy, the reports states the United States should participate fully in the management and conservation of global biodiversity resources by sharing information and expertise and assisting in building scientific infrastructure in developing nations.

How shall we do that?  How shall we respond to this challenge to gather, use and share biodiversity information, both domestically and internationally?  How shall we collaborate to draw together existing, planned, and developing information systems and databases into an integrated, interoperable whole that is capable of providing the tools of discovery, and techniques of analysis necessary for 21st century environmental and economic policy planning?

You, the participants in this symposium, represent the database, library, museum and data communities.  You bring–from your different communities–different perspectives, different knowledge and different experiences that can be brought together collaboratively to address these questions.

Over the next few days, we’ll discuss these questions in both plenary and break-outs sessions.  We’ll have time, as well, for informal and small group discussions.  We’ll talk about biodiversity information, the role of metadata in organizing and managing biodiversity information, the National Biological Information Infrastructure–the NBII–as it is currently developed, and the requirements for a next-generation NBII.  And, we’ll discuss how we can share our experiences and expertise beyond our own national borders.  At the conclusion of these few days, we’ll consider all of these deliberations and develop a collaborative Call to Action–a tangible, concrete set of recommendations.  This Call to Action is not only for ourselves and our colleagues, but for those responsible for considering–and, more to the point, for funding–the recommendations outlined in the PCAST report.

And somewhere in the middle of all of this, we’ll enjoy the results of the stewardship of earlier generations of the environmentally-minded, with a picnic lunch and expedition to Natural Bridge!