In 2013 the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) commissioned a survey among the Austrian scientific community.
Two questions concerning Open Access were also part of the survey:
- “How much need for promoting open access to scientific/scholarly publications and data do you see in the Austrian sciencesystem?”
- “To what extent do you believe the FWF’s funding portfolio covers promoting open access to scientific/scholarly publications and data for the Austrian science and innovation system?”
The results, published in March 2014 are unambiguous. On the one hand, all groups saw a high or very high need for promoting Open Access (only 14% saw no or low need). On the other hand, especially early career researchers, women and social scientists asked for more support by the FWF.
On the basis of these results, the study Developing an Effective Market for Open Access Article Processing Charges (commissioned by e.g. FWF, Wellcome Trust, Research Councils UK), the analysis of FWF’s publication costs and other international developments the FWF has recently adapted its Open Access funding policy.
The outlines of the policy are as follows:
- For new approved projects, the FWF introduces price caps (Gold Open Access = € 2,500 per article, Hybrid Open Access fees = € 1,500 per article) and ceases to make additional payments for any publication costs for subscription journals (e.g. colour figures, page charges and submission fees), see Peer Review Publications
- The programme Stand-alone Publications is extended to new digital Open Access publication formats (funding up to € 18.000). For this funding programme, publishers are invited to certify their peer review procedure, see Form for Certification of Publishers.
- The Creative Commons Licence CC BY is compulsory for all publication formats whenever the FWF has covered the costs ODER the costs have been covered by FWF.
- Applicants for research grants are explicitly asked to budget funds for processing, archiving and re-using open research data, see 2.6. “Other Costs”
- Applicants are advised to use ORCID persistent digital identifiers, which will be compulsory from January 1, 2016 onward.
- The Austrian Library Consortium KEMÖ and the FWF negotiate new Open Access models with publishers 2015 (see for example Austria and IOP Publishing in 2014 as well as Austria and Taylor & Francis 2015), in particular in line with recent developments in the Netherlands and in the UK.
Visit the FWF website for more information about the policy as well as contact details.