Funding for Open Access Publication Fees

["David Prosser" <david.prosser@bodley.ox.ac.uk>]

*Apologies for cross-posting*

The Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association (OASPA) is 
calling for greater clarity from research funders and 
institutions on the payment of open access publication fees. With 
an ever growing number of high quality open access journals 
available to authors there is still confusion regarding the 
funding streams that authors can use to pay publication charges. 
OASPA therefore welcomes the publication of a recent guide from 
the Research Information Network (RIN) and Universities UK (UUK): 
Paying for Open Access Publication Charges 
(http://www.rin.ac.uk/openaccess-payment-fees).

The Guide makes a number of helpful recommendations to both 
research funders and institutions. In particular, the existence 
of funds out of which open access publication charges can be made 
should be communicated to authors and the criteria under which 
these funds may be used should be clearly defined.

Alerting authors to the existence of publication funds allows 
authors to exercise greater choice in deciding which journals to 
submit their work to and ensures that publications compete on 
quality, services to authors and readers, and value-for-money. A 
recent series of studies by Professor John Houghton and 
co-authors has suggested that open access may provide greater 
returns on the investment tax-payers make on research than other 
access mechanisms. 
(http://www.knowledge-exchange.info/Default.aspx?ID=316) To 
realize these benefits funders and institutions should work on 
removing the barriers to the free uptake of open access.

OASPA will work towards providing greater clarity and 
transparency on the payment of open access publication charges 
and this is one topic that will be discussed at the First 
Conference on Open Access Publishing to be held in Lund, Sweden 
in September (http://www.oaspa.org/coasp/index.php)

David Prosser
On behalf of the OASAP Board