User:Filippo Morsiani/Open access in New Zealand

At present, most of New Zealand’s publicly funded research is not freely accessible and require citizens to pay a fee to access research funded by a taxpayer. However, this situation is quickly changing as, across the world, public funding bodies are insisting that all funded research be made freely available in order to increase public engagement, maximise innovation and accelerate the production of new knowledge. Currently, there are 116 OA journals published in New Zealand which are indexed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) and 145 OA journals which are indexed in the Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources (ROAD). Furthermore, a total of 12 OA repositories are indexed in the Directory of Open Access Repositories (OpenDOAR).

OA policies and mandates
Although the New Zealand Government has not announced a position on Open Access to scholarly research, a growing number of institutions have policies encouraging or mandating Open Access publication including the University of Waikato (Open Access Mandate passed in March 2014) and Lincoln University (Open Access mandate passed in 2013). There are currently 06 OA policies registered in the Registry of Open Access Repository Mandates and Policies (ROARMAP).

Creative Commons licences are being used to make scientific data freely available, especially in the public sector. On 22 May 2014, the National Library of New Zealand released its Policy for Use and Reuse of Collection Items. This policy was a timely move towards Openness that is underpinned by the New Zealand Government's Open Access and Licensing Framework.

Even without OA policies and mandates, a growing number of New Zealand researchers are found to choose to publish in Open Access journals or deposit in OA institutional repositories.

Additionally, contracts for the Marsden Fund, New Zealand's fundamental research fund, include a clause mandating that researchers share their research data, meta-data and samples collected within 12 months of completion of the project.