International co-operation in food science documentation

Abstract

In 1957, two English-language abstracting journals on food science and food technology ceased to exist. As a result, there appeared a certain shortage of informing the related subject fields in the English language literature. In various journals, several experts have raised the question of whether this shortage can be made up adequately by abstracting journals of more general interest. It has been unambiguously established that there is a strong demand on a special abstracting journal on food science and technology.
On the initiative of English and American institutions, after negotiations for years, finally it came to be felt that the publication of a desired abstracting journal would go beyond the capabilities, both professional and material, of one single country, and that – to achieve this end – an international co-operation should be established. Thus was it that in early 1968 efforts to form an international organization (International Food Information Service, IFIS for short) to edit and publish the new abstracting journal Food Science and Technology Abstracts (FSTA) met with success. The organization consists of three founding members such as the English Commonwealth Bureau of Dairy Science and Technology, the German (West) Institut für Dokumentationswesen, and the American Institute of Food Technologists. The Dutch PUDOC Centrum voor Landbouwpublikation en landbouwdocumentatie also joined the organization in 1969.
The organizational work based on financial funds created by the founding members representing four countries succeeded in forming an international co-operation in the field of documentation, too, inasmuch as participating in the preparation of abstracts are external specialists, individually or institutionally, who live in various countries and work in English, American, Czechoslovakian, East-German, Japanese, Canadian, Danish, Swedish institutions.
An international collaboration has also been formed in the production of the journal. Editorial work is being done by the editorial Office in England, putting the typed text onto punched or magnetic tape is performed by an editorial group in the Federal Republic of Germany, type-setting and casting by a punched tape controlled machine, as well as the work of dispatch by a West-German printing office, and the distribution by a publishing Office in England.
The brief outline of the work of preparation and organization gives a good example of international co-operation in science and technology.