Governance:Main Page

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Governance defines how AOWIS is maintained, evolved, and protected as an evolving open technical standard.

Because AOWIS is intended for real-world water and agricultural infrastructure, governance is essential to ensure that the standard remains trustworthy, neutral, transparent, and safe.

AOWIS governance aims to prevent control by any single company, political actor, donor organization, or individual.

Core Principles

• Openness – public documentation, public change history, transparent decision processes
• Neutrality – no exclusive ownership or privileged control
• Safety First – infrastructure reliability and human safety take priority over convenience
• Practicality – standards must remain usable in low-resource environments
• Accountability – decisions must be explainable and reviewable
• Long-Term Stability – stable versioning and predictable evolution
• Inclusion – contributions from engineers, operators, NGOs, technicians, and local communities

Maintainers

Responsible for editorial quality, consistency, publication workflow, and release management.

Technical Working Groups

Domain-focused groups developing modules such as:

• Water distribution
• Solar power systems
• Sensors & telemetry
• Offline communications
• Agricultural automation
• Safety systems

Field Advisory Council

Operators, NGOs, technicians, and practitioners with real deployment experience who provide operational feedback.

Steering Council

Coordinates long-term direction, resolves disputes, and protects neutrality of the standard.

Decision Model

AOWIS prefers consensus.

Where consensus cannot be reached:

1. technical matters are decided by qualified review
2. operational matters require field practicality review
3. governance matters require public justification and recorded votes

Change Management

All normative changes should include:

• rationale
• expected benefits
• risks
• compatibility impact
• implementation difficulty
• deployment relevance

Major changes require public review before adoption.

Versioning

AOWIS versions should distinguish:

• Draft
• Candidate Release
• Stable Release
• Long-Term Stable

Conflict of Interest

Participants must disclose material financial or organizational interests when relevant to decisions.

No contributor may unilaterally control certification, procurement influence, or standard direction.

Local Legitimacy

Where AOWIS is used in specific regions, governance should actively include local technical voices and deployment stakeholders.

Standards affecting communities should not be designed only remotely.

Future Areas

• Certification frameworks
• Compliance testing
• Regional councils
• Translation governance
• Training accreditation
• Safety incident review processes

AOWIS governance exists to protect trust in the standard over decades.