Spanish consortium launches groundbreaking Read & Publish agreement
The Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) Library Network has signed an innovative Read & Publish licensing agreement with the Royal Society of Chemistry. That means CSIC authors are now able to publish Open Access in Royal Society of Chemistry journals, as well as having access to read the full range of scientific content from these titles.
This two-year pilot agreement, which will run until December 2020, represents an important step in CSIC’s path towards Open Access and is the first of its kind among research and academic institutions in Spain.
The Read & Publish model allows articles published in journals of the Royal Society of Chemistry by authors from CSIC institutions to be made publicly available at the time of publication, at no cost to the author.
Strengthening relationships
Stephen Rumbelow, Royal Society of Chemistry Director of Sales & Marketing, says: "This agreement represents another important milestone both in our commitment to open access publishing and in underlining the platform we have to connect the European chemistry community.
"We are excited that we have made such a promising agreement with CSIC, as this deal is the first of its kind in Spain – we have long-standing links to the Spanish chemistry community and this will only strengthen our relationship and support for them."
New business model for CSIC
Agnès Ponsati, CSIC’s Director of the Unit of Scientific Information Resources for Research, is responsible for their research open access policies. She says: "This is the first agreement CSIC has undertaken of a type that we call 'transformative'. It is a small step, but important, since it is the first in our case, to promote the transformation we want to see in the scholarly communication landscape.
"This is the kind of agreement we want to reach from now on with those publishers with whom we have subscription agreements. In 2016, CSIC signed the expression of interest of the OA2020 initiative, which aims to transform the current subscription model towards a "read and publish" model. What we are announcing today is the first realisation of this commitment.
"Reaching this agreement with a partner such as the Royal Society of Chemistry, which shares many of our values, helps us evolve into new business models that align better with our mission and vision of how to share the results of research. "