EIFL joins associations in support of immediate open access

Posted: May 14, 2014

EIFL (Electronic Information for Libraries) has joined other major international associations such as COAR (Confederation of Open Access Repositories), LIBER (Ligue des Bibliothèques Européennes de Recherche - Association of European Research Libraries), National Science Library, Chinese Academy of Sciences, OpenAIRE (Open Access Infrastructure for Research in Europe) and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) to underscore our support for immediate Open Access to research articles.

As organizations committed to the principle that access to information advances discovery, accelerates innovation and improves education, we endorse the policies and practices that enable Open Access - immediate, barrier free access to and reuse of scholarly articles.

Policies that promote Open Access are increasingly being adopted worldwide by research funders, academic institutions and national governments in order to improve the use and value of scholarly research.

We fully support such policies and the dual avenues for implementing them: open access repositories and open access journals. These policies play an important role in creating an environment where our collective investments in research can be maximized for the benefit of the public, and for society at large.

Many policies have employed the use of embargo periods - delayed access to research articles for a short period of time to help protect publishers’ subscription revenue as they shift to new business models.

We consider the use of embargo periods as an acceptable transitional mechanism to help facilitate a wholesale shift towards Open Access.

However, embargo periods dilute the benefits of open access policies and we believe that, if they are adopted, they should be no more than six months for the life and physical sciences, 12 months for social sciences and humanities. We further believe that mechanisms for reducing - or eliminating - embargo periods should be included in any Open Access policy.

Any delay in the open availability of research articles curtails scientific progress and stifles innovation, and places unnecessary constraints in delivering the benefits of research back to the public.