Cross-Domain Metadata Interoperability: Lessons Learnt in INSPIRE

Since 2007, EU Member States have been involved in creating an infrastructure for spatial information in Europe (INSPIRE), based on a legal and technical interoperability framework. This paper presents some of the lessons learnt during the implementation of this infrastructure (which started in 2009) and during work on data and service interoperability coordinated with European and international initiatives. We describe a number of critical interoperability issues affecting both scientific and government data and metadata, and propose how these problems could be effectively addressed by a closer collaboration of the government and scientific communities, by taking advantage of their complementary competencies, and by influencing the development and adoption of standards.