[Partners]
About ZBW:
The ZBW – German National Library of Economics – Leibniz Information Centre for Economics is the world’s largest specialist library for economics, with more than four million publications in printed or electronic format and subscriptions to 31,970 periodicals and journals. The ZBW collects economics literature and subject-specific information from all over the world as well as books, journals and digital media from management practice.
The German National Library of Economics procures economic literature and subject specific information from all over the world. The ZBW makes them available to users by interlibrary lending and document delivery as well as by local lending and uses them as the basis of its sophisticated online information services. Within this context, the ZBW is among the leading Information Centres for developing and applying the latest semantic technologies and Web 2.0 technologies for highly innovative information services. These leading-edge technologies are developed in collaboration with internationally renowned research institutes in information technology from all over the world. The ZBW is also a WTO depositary library and maintains a European Documentation Centre at both locations, in Kiel and Hamburg.
Besides various document delivery and consulting services, the ZBW offers EconBiz as a single point of access to the world’s economics literature and information, the database ECONIS with more than five million datasets and the reference service EconDesk which provides brief facts from economics via e-mail, telephone or chat. With EconStor, the ZBW offers a platform for Open Access publishing to German researchers in economics. These online services are available to the scientific community, policy makers, decision makers and the public worldwide and without charge at www.zbw.eu.
The ZBW is also an active partner in several national and international projects and cooperations. Among these are the cooperation with the Kiel Institute for the World Economy on the Open Access Journal “Economics” or the international cooperation within the Network of European Economists Online (NEEO).
The German National Library of Economics – Leibniz Centre for Economics was founded in 1919 and has been a member of the Leibniz Association since 1966.
It is a foundation under public law, financed by the Federal and State governments, and invests more than €2.4 million every year into the acquisition of current economics titles. More than 250 staff are employed at both branches of the library in Kiel and Hamburg.
About RatSWD:
The German Data Forum (RatSWD) is an independent body of empirical re-searchers from universities, colleges and other institutions of independent scientific research, as well as representatives of important data producers. It was estab-lished by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research in 2004. The goal of the RatSWD is to sustainably improve the research data infrastructure underlying empirical research and contribute to its competitive ability on an international level. An evaluation carried out by the German Council of Science and Humanities showed that the RatSWD has succeeded in opening up and improving access to existing data and in creating an increased synergy between science and data producers.
The RatSWD has established itself as an institution of exchange and of mediation between the interests of science and data producers and therefore an important platform for communication and coordination. With regard to standardization and quality control of data and the further development of research data centers and data service centers, the RatSWD plays an important role in the social, economic and behavioral sciences by performing an advisory function, initiating new developments and securing quality.
Core tasks of the RatSWD are the following:
- Making recommendations on how to further secure and improve data access, especially by means of establishing, standardizing and continually evaluating research data centers and data service centers,
- Making recommendations on how to improve the use of data by means of providing adequate documentation and scientific and statistical data (research data portals, metadata),
- Consulting of scientific institutions and organizations on how to incorporate infrastructure data into teaching and research,
- Making recommendations on research subjects and tasks, which pertain to the conceptual development of a data infrastructure on the national, European and international level,
- Making recommendations on how to make the production and provision of data, relevant to social research, more efficient,
- Consulting the Federal Ministry and the corresponding Länder governments on the further development of a sciencebased data infrastructure,
- Consulting public (and private) data producers,
- Consulting data producers on the validation of scientific research institutions (certification) that are not institutionally part of independent scientific research,
- Preparation and realization of the Conference for Social and Economic Data (Konferenz für Wirtschafts- und Sozialdaten, KSWD)
In all of its work, the RatSWD pays regard to current discussions that promote sustainable development, as well as the equal social participation of women and men.
