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During the recent “State of Land Data & Information in East Africa: Catalyzing East Africa's Land Data Ecosystem”, 8-10th May in Nairobi, Kenya Research4Life held on the 10th of May a workshop that presented the Research4Life programmes, and focusing on information resources related to legal resources and land.

The workshop focused on the following R4L programmes - AGORA (Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture), OARE (Online Access to Research in the Environment) and especially GOALI (Global Online Access to Legal Information).

The 51 participants explored how to find scientific journals and books in Research4Life, in particular legal research related to land. 

Research4Life training overview

The presentation focused on information resources and legal research related to land, emphasizing the cross-cutting aspects. 

Topics included what is Research4Life, the content portals, how to search, an introduction to legal information and legal systems, and the legal research process.

On AGORA..

The AGORA programme (Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA), set up by FAO with majot publishers, together with major publishers, enables developing countries to gain access to an outstanding digital library collection in the fields of food, agriculture, environmental science and related social sciences.

AGORA is one of the five programmes that make up Research4Life: AGORA, HINARI, OARE, ARDI and GOALI. OARE (Online Access to Research in the Environment) is managed by UNEP in partnership with Yale University and international scientific publishers.

On OARE..

OARE provides access to journals, e-books, and other information resources on the natural environment, including ecology, climatology, geography, environmental law and policy and more. Both AGORA and OARE can also be excellent resources on land-related information in scientific journals and books.

..and GOALI

GOALI was highlighted, the newest Research4Life programme which deals with research for global justice. GOALI is managed by the International Labour Organization (ILO), and provides free or low-cost online access to legal research and training in the developing world.

GOALI is a public-private partnership of ILO as a UN agency, together with Brill Nijhoff, the International Training Centre of the ILO and academic partners Cornell Law School Library and the Lillian Goldman Law Library at Yale Law School. 

Users can access thousands of peer-reviewed journals and e-books in selected subject areas of law from the world’s leading academic publishers.

Lively discussions ensued regarding conversion of customary land rights, land tenure, gender issues in inheritance, legal pluralism and how different countries are finding pragmatic ways forward, continuing some of the topics from the day before.

The State of Land Data and Information in East Africa Meeting

The State of Land Data & Information in East Africa: Catalyzing East Africa's Land Data Ecosystem’, co-organized by FAO Kenya, the Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD), the Local Development Research Institute, GODAN Africa, Research4Life and the Land Portal, at the University of Nairobi on May 8-10th 2019.

The overall goal of the workshop was to uncover the land data & information ecosystem in East Africa and contribute to foster a regional policy dialogue on access to data.

The meeting follows the launch by the Land Portal of the “State of Land Information: Uncovering the Information Ecosystem” reports for four countries in East Africa, which aims to uncover the many different sources of land data and information in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and South Sudan.

For the very first time, there has been a look at the entire landscape of data and information related to key land topics in these four countries, assessing over 690 land resources from 317 different sources, to see trends and gaps when it comes to data availability as well as how accessible it is online.