In 2021, the ARDC partnered with Australia’s five Learned Academies and ACOLA to engage Australia’s greatest minds, the Fellows of the Academies, to develop insights into ensuring all of Australia’s research sector can undertake excellent data-enabled research. Importantly, the project sought to help build a more coherent data policy and strategic data planning environment to uplift national data infrastructure. The approach recognised that different disciplines have different challenges and starting points and considerations for interdisciplinary research.

The Australian Learned Academies’ Future of Research Data project worked to understand and improve the coordination of research data priorities across disciplines. The project combines the leadership and strategic insights of the Academies and ACOLA with the national data infrastructure expertise of the ARDC.

Firstly, each Academy assessed how data assets are currently used within their discipline areas and what is needed to enable better utilisation in the future to achieve world-class research. Academies undertook extensive consultation, ran workshops, and completed scenario analysis, surveys and desktop research. These reports are:

• Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences (AAHMS) report
• Australian Academy of the Humanities (AAH) report
• Australian Academy of Science (AAS) report
• Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA) report
• Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering (ATSE) report

This document identifies the key findings from across the Academy reports aimed at enabling world-leading interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research by maximising the value of data and ensuring we have robust national data capabilities.