The information on this page is essential for the purposes of citing the international data correctly and in acknowledging the copyright and other intellectual property owners. It should be read in conjunction with the End User Licence. Publications/research papers based on ESDS International data collections should always acknowledge the data source with a citation in the reference section.

Why should I cite data?

It is important to cite data in the same way that you cite other sources of information, such as articles and books for several reasons:

• it enables easy reuse and verification of data,
• citation allows the level of usage and therefore impact of data to be tracked,
• it create a scholarly record that recognises and rewards data producers.

How should I cite data?

Each time data is downloaded from Beyond 20/20, citation information is included in the download file. For example, if you downloaded a selection of data from the Sept 2011 edition of the IMF Direction of Trade Statistics, the following text would appear at the top of the download file:

• International Monetary Fund (2011): Direction of Trade Statistics (Edition: Sept 2011). ESDS International, University of Manchester. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5257/imf/dots/2011-09

Other examples include:

• Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (2011): Main Economic Indicators (Edition: Sept 2011). ESDS International, University of Manchester. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5257/oecd/mei/2011-09.

• International Energy Agency (2011): Energy Prices and Taxes (Edition: 2011, Q2). ESDS International, University of Manchester. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5257/iea/energy.prices/2011q2.

• World Bank (2011): World Development Indictors (Edition: April 2011). ESDS International, University of Manchester. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5257/wb/wdi/2011-04.

This information should be copied and pasted into the References section of any research paper in which the data has been used - see the Guide to citing international data for step-by-step instructions.

The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) included in the citation is a string of numbers and letters which provide a means of persistently identifying an object on a digital network - thus allowing subsequent researchers to find the identical data used in that research. They would simply need to input 'http://dx.doi.org/10.5257/imf/dots/2011-09' into a DOI resolver (e.g. http://dx.doi.org/) and would then be taken to a web page providing information about the IMF DOTS at ESDS International and how to access it.

If you have any queries about how you should be citing international data, please do get in touch with the ESDS International Helpdesk .