The UNEP Ontologies and the OBO Foundry

It is now generally accepted that wherever we need to address multiple different kinds of data deriving from multiple different kinds of sources, a strategy is required to ensure interoperability across the various systems involved. The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) is developing an ontology for use in their knowledge management platform—the Sustainable Development Goals Interface Ontology (SDGIO). The UNEP approach to achieving interoperability is modeled on the OBO (Open Biomedical Ontologies) Foundry, an initiative of ontology developers working in a range of life science domains who have been working since 2004 to develop a suite of ontologies which would work together consistently in such a way as to advance the integration of data [1]. To serve such integration the OBO Foundry members formulated and tested an evolving set of principles for ontology development which are now being used by ontology developers also in other areas, including manufacturing, geology, transport and security.