Abstract
Digital data archiving and research data management have become increasingly important for institutions in South Africa, particularly after the announcement by the National Research Foundation, one of the principal South African academic research funders, recommending these actions for the research that they fund. A case study undertaken during the latter half of 2014, among the biological sciences researchers at a South African university, explored the state of data management and archiving at this institution and the readiness of researchers to engage with sharing their digital research data through repositories. It was found that while some researchers were already engaged with digital data archiving in repositories, neither researchers nor the university had implemented systematic research data management.
Highlights
A number of articles published in this journal are pertinent to the topic of digital data archiving[1,2], in particular the need for the preservation of long-term ecological data sets, which are crucial for understanding the management of the South African environment[3]
The international focus on research data makes it important for South African researchers and policymakers to engage with the imperatives of ensuring that data are managed in a way that enables long-term security and accessibility
A survey was undertaken to investigate the state of data management and archiving within the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Cape Town (UCT) and the readiness of researchers to engage with sharing their digital research data in repositories
Summary
A number of articles published in this journal are pertinent to the topic of digital data archiving[1,2], in particular the need for the preservation of long-term ecological data sets, which are crucial for understanding the management of the South African environment[3]. A survey was undertaken to investigate the state of data management and archiving within the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Cape Town (UCT) and the readiness of researchers to engage with sharing their digital research data in repositories. It will be seen from the results of the survey reported below that these repositories are among those utilised by the academic researchers who were surveyed. Whereas 88% of respondents indicated that their research should be made available for future research, only 18% budgeted for data management and data curation and only 26% had a data preservation plan
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