JISC

Partners call on European Commission to guarantee open access to publicly funded research

JISC is among a group of European organisations which today launched a petition to the European Commission calling on it to support public access to research outputs shortly after their publication.

Organised by SPARC Europe, JISC, SURF, the German Research Foundation (DFG) and Denmark's Electronic Research Library (DEFF), the petition urges the Commission to follow the lead of other research funding agencies in mandating the publication of articles arising from EC-related funding after a given time period in open access archives. It also calls on the Commission to explore a European-wide approach to policies and practices surrounding the development of digital repositories as a means of making more visible the fruits of European research and maximising the return on public investment in research.

In January 2006 the European Commission published the Study on the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication

Markets of Europe. The Study resulted from a detailed analysis of the current scholarly journal publication market, together with extensive consultation with all the major stakeholders within the scholarly communication process (researchers, funders, publishers, librarians, research policymakers, etc.). The Study noted that 'dissemination and access to research results is a pillar in the development of the European Research Area' and it made a number of balanced and reasonable recommendations to improve the visibility and usefulness of European research outputs.

Now, a year after publication of the Study, JISC, along with its partners, is urging the EC to endorse the recommendations in full. ‘Research must be widely disseminated and read to be useful,’ the petition suggests, going on to outline the economic advantages of widening access to publicly funded research, including the encouragement of further research and promotion of European research outputs worldwide.

Rachel Bruce, JISC director, Information Environment, said: ‘Over the past year there has been significant progress in improving access to publicly funded research. This has included statements and policies from research funding bodies as well as investment in open repository networks. This progress will be strengthened by the implementation of the recommendations of the Commissions study. With the backing of organisations across Europe, this petition demonstrates the level of support for rapid and open access to publicly funded research.'

EC petition