Reflecting the conference title – Becoming Open: Capacity Building and Community Collaboration in the Arab World – and aligning with the UAE’s Year of Community, the conference will focus on four key pillars:

1. Community building and engagement. One of FORM’s central missions is to help open science advocates from across the Arab states form connections, establish communities, and build successful collaborations with each other and with communities and organisations elsewhere in the world. We invite proposals concerning the development of collaborative communities and engagement in bilateral and multilateral scientific diplomacy.
2. Capacity building and localization. One of the key priorities raised by our stakeholders is the importance of localising discussions, activities, outputs, tools and solutions relating to open science, in order to facilitate effective capacity building. We invite proposals concerning the development of skills and resources for the region’s research communities, and strategies to effectively share knowledge.
3. Open access policies and publishing. Although open access is just one facet of the broader open research landscape, it remains one of the most well known and the most contentious. The development of appropriate policies and practises, the allocation of funding and resources, the incentivisation towards perverse research behaviours, and concerns about the issues of inclusivity and commercialisation – all continue to dominate regional and global discussions. We invite proposals relating to policies, funding, research protocols and assessment, and bibliodiversity and inclusivity.
4. Investing in Open. One issue that is repeatedly raised by our stakeholders is the question of funding. Inclusive and equitable access to everything, everywhere, for everyone is a brilliant concept – but how is this vision to be funded? We invite proposals relating to open science funding and investment, open and interoperable infrastructures, and community-owned and community-led Open Science infrastructures and publications.

We want to thank all the contributors, the board, and everyone involved in developing this scientific programme. And we hope many of the wider community of researchers and open science advocates from across the Arab region will join us (either online or in person).

The Early bird discount will run until the end of August, reducing conference fees by 30%, and online attendance is totally free!