Vol.5 No.3 2012

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Research paper : International cooperation for the utilization of earth observational data in an integrated manner (K. Iwao)−167−Synthesiology - English edition Vol.5 No.3 (2012) endorsement of financial support from the member countries or participating organizations of GEO in the second item was disadvantageous to the private companies that did not necessarily belong to the member countries or organizations. Ultimately, it was considered important to guarantee the stable operation of the core system of the GEOSS by obtaining the promise for financial support from the member countries or organizations, even if the organization or private company that provided the component lost the financial guarantee. Therefore, this item was given the weight of 20 %.The result of scoring was not disclosed to the public. However, the scoring results were disclosed by request to the organizations that were screened, including the organizations that were not selected.6 Evaluation resultWhen the cause of user confusion was clarified, it was found that the CI functioned only with the combination of certain WP and CL. This was identified as one of the causes of different search results. As individual organizations developed and advanced original systems for search and display, the system linkage with other organizations was not realized. Also, it was found that for the registry that was provided officially by only one organization, some organizations that provided the CL made the search of their own data possible. These two were the reasons that the search result and the usable service differed according to the combination of the WP and CL. It can be said that the universality was lost when the originality and convenience of the function were pursued by adding functions and original data particular to the organization.As a result of the general evaluation of functionality, usability, and long-term operability, the WP offered by the European Space Agency and the Food and Agriculture Organization, and the CL offered by the USGS were selected. The combination including the registry offered by the USGS was recommended as the CI of the GEO. The GCI Coordination Team Report[12] was accepted at the Earth Observation Summit held in Beijing in 2010. As a result, the European and American organizations that lead the global earth observation were selected.The evaluation and selection of the elemental functions of the CI resulted in the specification for accessing the earth observation information and services to be selected as de jure standards, rather than being left as de facto standards. Considering that the principle of GEOSS is not to seek integration of the observation and information systems that are managed by different organizations, it is desirable that the de facto standard is implemented as the users actually use the system, and the technology with low universality is eliminated. However, in establishing the standard that may develop into conflict of interest among the countries and organizations, it is believed that the approach of selecting the de jure standard was effective.For the WP, the display method of the geospatial data including the earth observation data was standardized, while for the CL, the definition of the metadata of earth observation data, the method for mutual use of data in various formats, and the data search method were standardized. In the process of the evaluation and selection of the CL, these de jure standards were clearly established.7 DiscussionLooking back at the process by which the de jure standard for the earth observation field was established, the points to note in creating the international standard are summarized.First, care was taken to form a community to promote international agreement in discussing the de jure standard. To ensure the wide and international use of the technology, the practitioners and users, including those of the developing countries, were highly influential, as well as the technology specialists representing the countries.Second, consideration was given to temporal speed. The fact that there was a necessity to set the de jure standard indicated that there were diverse original technologies existing in the world, and that might have caused the confusion among the users. To clear up the confusion quickly, a clear timeline was set, the optimal de jure standard was decided in the limited time, and this turned out beneficial to the users.Third, care was taken to ensure fairness in the evaluation process. In this case, the guarantee of fairness of the evaluation result was maintained carefully by establishing a separate investigating team from the evaluation committee, and by conducting the actual evaluation and screening only after the approval of the evaluation index by the GEO executive country committee. The result was widely accepted because of fair processes such as the independency of evaluation and the transparency of individual screening, in the process of selecting the international standard. In fact, the private companies that were not selected this time did not express unfairness in the selection and continues to support the activities of the GEO to present. This is because fairness was maintained in the evaluation process. The evaluation and selection processes could be positioned as the guideline when evaluating the voluntary participation of the private companies. For the private companies, the evaluation result was obtained based on the evaluation by users in various fields around the world, and it provided useful information for reviewing the usability and issues in their products.From the standpoint of conducting an international

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