EN_EU-LAC-OpenAccess_Conference_BACKGROUND%20NOTE.pdf

Type: Document | Status: ready
← All sources

EUROPEAN UNION – LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN DIALOGUE ON OPEN ACCESS POLICIES Bi-Regional Conference on Open Access in an Open Science Environment 6-7 June 2023 Introduction Openness and transparency are core values in EU policies for research and innovation. Indeed, the EU has dedicated considerable efforts to develop a robust open science policy at the heart of the European Research Area (ERA). The goal is that researchers s hare knowledge and data as early as possible in the research process with all relevant actors, leading to higher quality, impact and responsiveness of research. Further, the EU framework programme for research and innovation, Horizon Europe, mainstreams op en science practices and requirements across the programme and makes it one of its fundamental principles.
In turn, for the last decades Latin America has had a leading role in non -commercial open access with a strong emphasis on non -for-profit and resear ch-community driven initiatives and infrastructures. National and institutional open access policies and mandates are progressively being set in the countries of the region. While open access is fairly well-established in LAC, some countries are still lagging behind.
LA Referencia (the Federated Network of Institutional Repositories of Scientific Publications), SciELO (bibliographic database and digital library), Redalyc-AmeliCA, (communication infrastructure for scholarly publishing and open science), Latindex (directory of academic journals), or the work done by CLACSO (Latin American Council for Social Sciences) are some of the open access initiatives developed in the region, some of them in cooperation with EU countries, mainly Spain and Portugal. LAC and the EU are strategic regions for one another, and natural partners to collaborate in developing research and innovation policy priorities such as open science. Collaboration on open science would result in further alignment between science, technology and innovation policies in the EU and in LAC. This should also help contribute to the further development of the EU - CELAC Common Research Area, which is a key objective in the bi -regional Research and Innovation (R&I) cooperation. The ambitious EU open science policy, the leading role LAC has regarding community driven and non -for-profit open access initiatives, and the increasing attention and support the EU is paying to those, are factors that make this activity particularly relevant and timely for both regions.

Objectives The overall objective of the Bi -Regional Conference on Open Access in an Open Science Environment is to contribute to reinforce the EU –LAC cooperation in research and innovation, to gain a better, mutual understanding of current policies and implementation of open science in the two regions and to identify opportunities for collaboration and further alignment. The specific objectives are: ✓ To enhance common open science approaches and to promote compatible visions between the main R&I actors in the two regions through a mutual learning approach. ✓ To identify common challenges and complementarity of approaches towards open science practices and to explore possible joint actions. ✓ To promote a better understanding in the EU of the non-commercial decentralized open access digital infrastructures developed in the LAC region through a direct contact with their main actors.
✓ To jointly discuss possible paths for a more coordinated approach for enabling open access to scientific results across LAC region and the EU ✓ To explore further collaboration initiatives for a coordinated implementation of the open science policies in the EU and LAC region.

Report on Open Access Policies in LAC and the EU
As a preparation for this Bi-Regional Conference, the independent expert report Open Access Policies in Latin America, the Caribbean and The European Union: Progress Towards a Political Dialogue has been funded and published by the European Commission (EC). The report makes a clear and detailed description of the current state of the art of the regional initiatives and national open access policies to publications and research data in LAC and in the EU, identifies common challenges and makes recommendations for policy action, thus providing all the participants with a common ground to set the discussion.
The report is structured in five sections:
Introduction. It clarifies that public action in favour of open access is a public policy that fits into the category of R&D public policies; it explains how these policies where stablished as a mechanism for solving the public problem of access to scientific content; it traces their effects – both intended an d unintended –on the stakeholders, and it explains how these mandates have been evolving. Regional open access initiatives in LAC , that describes how the open access movement in LAC has been developing in the last two decades and the role played by key act ors like LA Referencia, Redalyc -AmeliCA, Latindex, SciELO, and CLACSO in creating a public, decentralized, non -commercial, community driven open access ecosystem populated with federated repositories and diamond academic journals sustained in open protocol s.

Country files for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Uruguay, and the European Union . R&D national systems, open access policies, and implementation key digital infrastructures are analysed for each country and for the EU. Descriptions of the R&D national systems include detailed information on the legal framework, the governance, the funding mechanisms for R&D activities, the performing institutions, and the assessment agencies for each co untry and the EU. Description of the open access policies and its implementation infrastructures includes references to the political initiatives, the content of the national, regional and/or institutional mandates, if any, and a comprehensive description of the degree of maturity of the essential platforms for open access policies: repositories, national academic journals, and curriculum and research information management systems.
Common challenges between LAC and the EU . This section analyses common pat terns in the design of national R&D systems in LAC countries, spots collective problems, and identifies trends in open access policies and their implementation infrastructures. It argues that in LAC countries there are homogenous science, technology and innovation (STI) governance systems and a significant presence of open access initiatives – in some cases there are national policies and in other cases there are institutional ones, all of them strongly consistent with the European policy – and a solid netw ork of interoperable open access repositories. However, very uneven support for academic journals has been detected among the different countries, whereas an almost total coverage of curriculum and research information systems was found.
Recommendations f or Policy Action . A set of recommendations for political action are further proposed for establishing a preliminary roadmap towards a more coordinated intra -LAC and EU-LAC collaboration on open science. These are structured around 4 priority objectives, br oken down into 7 actions and articulated in 19 specific measures. For each of them, a time frame is suggested, and the target actors have been identified: the LAC countries at the national level, the LAC countries and the EU, or the LAC region as a whole a nd the EU:

O1. Strengthen the governance and the financing of STI systems in LAC. Actions Actors Time frame A1. Spreading good practices in LAC countries. M1. Ongoing interregional initiatives should be strengthened and articulated for this action to be included in their agendas.
M2. LAC countries will ensure continuous, realistic, concrete and committed strategic planning for STI, with coverage between legislature periods.

Short term

O1. Strengthen the governance and the financing of STI systems in LAC. Actions Actors Time frame A2. Guaranting the regularity, the economic sustainability and the scope of research funding programmes in LAC countries.
M3. Existing funding programmes will be supported and strengthened. M4. Funding programmes will be extended to cover all areas requiring support and promotion: research staff training, research projects, scientific infrastructures, networks and innovation actions, to cite a few examples.

Short term

O2. Expand the coverage of open access policies in LAC. Actions Actors Time frame A3. Developing open access policies in those LAC countries that do not yet have them. These policies will: M5. Be coherent with those of the rest of the LAC region and with the EU. M6. Address FAIR management of research data. Medium term

O3. Strengthen open science digital infrastructures in both regions. Actions Actors Time frame A4. Funding non-commercial, open source repositories, diamond journals and curriculum management systems. M7. The EU and LAC will create public calls specifically aimed at developing, sustaining, improving coverage and strengthening interoperability of digital infrastructures. M8. The EU will include LAC countries in all funding calls for for this purpose.

Medium term

O3. Strengthen open science digital infrastructures in both regions. Actions Actors Time frame A5. Jointly seeking political, technical and technological solutions for digital infrastructures. These solutions will: M9. Involve LAC countries in European infrastructures such as EOSC and ORE. M10. Promote the implementation of open source software based non-commercial digital platforms. M11. Support diamond open access journals. M12. Promote multilingualism in scientific communication. M13. Extend the use of non-commercial and decentralised metadata standards and persistent identifiers.

Medium term

O4. Create research assessment systems aligned with open science principles in both regions. Actions Actors Time frame A6. Creating institutional research assessment systems aimed at the promotion of open science. These systems will: M14. Require open access mandates compliance to all scientific outputs to be assessed. M15. Include all research outputs such as data, software, protocols, methodologies, open educational resources, citizen science activities, scientific dissemination, etc. under assessment processes.
M16. Avoid the use of journal impact bibliometric indicators for scientific quality measurement. M17. Assess the social impact of knowledge.

Medium term

A7. Cooperating for a comprehensive and coordinated reform of research assessment systems.
M18. Synergies will be sought between the existing FOLEC (LAC) and COARA (EU) initiatives.
M19. The EU will include LAC countries in programmes and initiatives to be launched to reform research evaluation systems.

Medium term

Questions for the debate

  1. Open science: are we all going in the same direction? What is the main vision behind policies for Open Science in the two regions? What are the main challenges to realize these policies?
  2. How far and how close are LAC countries and the EU in their open access policies
  3. What can we learn from each other when implementing open access public policies?
  4. What are the best strategies to ensure a scholarly communication ecosystem accessible to all? What is the role of publishing service providers in the open science jigsaw puzzle?
  5. How can we promote the sustainable development, funding and governance of research infrastructures for Open Science? Is there room for joint cooperation and integration in their development?
  6. Can we identify collaboration areas for common actions that will help implement and mainstream the practice of open science in the two regions?

General Information
• Host organisation: European Commission • Date: June 6-7, 2023 • Speakers: R&I decision makers and high-level OA policy implementation agents from the LAC countries and the EC. • Participants: R&I decision makers, funding agencies, research performing organizations and assessment institutions from the LAC countries and the EC, diamond open access publishers, repository managers, OA policy implementation actors, researchers, librarians, stakeholders of the open science paradigm, and civil society representatives. • Language: Spanish. Interpretation services for English and Portuguese will be available.