An exciting joint project entitled “BioDATA Advanced - Accelerating biodiversity research through DNA barcodes, collection and observation data” was submitted from the Museum of Natural History at the University of Oslo in cooperation with the South African National Biodiversity Institute and Altai State University. This Partnership between national nodes of GBIF from Norway (GBIF Norway), South Africa (SANBI-GBIF) and the Altai State University including a team of researchers from the South Siberian Botanical Garden in Russia, has been successfully approved and is to be funded by the Norwegian Agency for International Cooperation and Improvement of the Quality of Higher Education (DIKU), for 5 years. It is further supported by Professor Dmitry Shchigel (GBIF Secretariat, Copenhagen, Denmark) and the project is being led by Professor Hugo de Boer from the University of Oslo, Norway.

The project will offer young researchers from South Africa, Norway and Russia, the opportunity to participate in academic mobility and professional training in the study of biodiversity, using modern skills in the field of methods of obtaining, processing, publishing and using open data. Eight courses in advanced biodiversity data skills are planned and six student internships. The courses are designed to create a network of exchange between professionals and students through targeted internships and to facilitate open access to biodiversity data both in the participating countries and around the world.