Open Access requirements of external funders
Many external research funders at home and abroad have Open Access (OA) mandates, requiring researchers to make scholarly publications resulting from their funding publicly available.
See Ghent University policy on scholarly publishing for institutional OA requirements.
Overview
Find a quick overview below of the various aspects of external research funders' OA policies.
Overview of external funder OA requirements
| FWO | BELSPO | Horizon 2020 / ERC (2014-2020) |
Horizon Europe / ERC (2021-2027) |
|
| OA mandate | Yes | No (mandatory deposit, optional OA) |
Yes | Yes |
| Scope | Peer-reviewed journal articles | All types of scholarly publication + grey literature | Peer-reviewed scholarly publications | Peer-reviewed scholarly publications |
| OA route | Via repository ('green' OA) as a minimum |
|
Via repository ('green' OA) as a minimum | Via repository ('green' OA) as a minimum |
| Embargo | Maximum 12 months |
|
|
No embargo allowed |
| Licence | No requirements |
|
CC licence (e.g. CC BY) or similar recommended |
|
| Rights retention | No requirements | No requirements | No requirements | Necessary to comply with Horizon Europe OA requirements |
| OA publishing costs |
Eligible |
|
Eligible during lifetime of project |
|
Research Foundation - Flanders (FWO)
FWO adopts the principle that publicly funded research should be publicly available. It requires beneficiaries to make published research results available in OA.
Scope
The FWO OA requirement applies to
- All FWO researchers, i.e. all holders of an FWO fellowship, project or grant
- Published research resulting wholly or partially from FWO funding
- Peer-reviewed journal articles only
FWO encourages and recommends researchers to also make other publication types (including PhD theses), underlying research data, and works not resulting from FWO-funded research available in OA.
OA route
- Researchers have to at least follow the 'green' OA route, i.e. deposit journal articles in scope of the OA requirement in a publications repository (such as Ghent University's Biblio) and make it publicly available.
- In addition, they can publish directly in OA (e.g. in an OA journal), but this is not mandatory.
Embargo
Journal articles in scope of the requirement have to be made available in OA as soon as possible, but FWO accepts a maximum embargo period of 12 months (reflecting what is made possible by Belgian OA legislation).
Licences
FWO has no licence requirements for publications made available in OA.
OA publishing costs
Any costs associated with OA publishing (e.g. Article Processing Charges), can be charged as bench fees as part of beneficiaries' FWO funding.
More information
- Open Access on the FWO website
BELSPO
BELSPO is committed to making tax payer-funded research available to all in society. It has a policy mandating deposit of publications in a repository, with optional OA.
Scope
The BELSPO requirement to deposit in a repository and provide optional OA applies to
- Research wholly or partially funded by BELSPO research programs, or from research performed by scientific staff as part of their assignment in federal science policy organisations
- Scholarly publications of all types and grey literature
In addition, BELSPO strongly recommends direct publishing in OA for scientific journal articles.
OA route
BELSPO mandates the 'green' route to OA:
- Deposit of all publications and grey literature in an institutional/thematic repository is compulsory.
- Scientific journal articles have to be deposited in a repository within 3 months after acceptance for publication.
- Making deposited full texts OA is optional. They are only to be made publicly accessible if no embargoes or exceptional protection provisions apply (e.g. for quality, strategic, security, commercial (patent-related) or privacy reasons).
In addition, for scientific journal articles, OA publishing is recommended, more specifically by publishing in Diamond OA journals/platforms, or in Gold OA journals with transparent pricing policies and fair pricing.
Embargo
An embargo period of up to 12 months (humanities, arts and social sciences) or 6 months (scientific, technical and medical fields) is accepted before making deposited journal articles publicly available.
Licences
Scientific journal articles and monographs published in OA should be made available under a specific Creative Commons licence: CC BY (articles, monographs) and CC BY-NC-SA (monographs only).
OA publishing costs
- Costs associated with OA publishing of scientific journal articles and monographs (Article/Book Processing charges) are eligible for reimbursement if the journal/publisher meets specified quality, transparency and fairness criteria.
- Maximum amounts for reimbursement apply: up to € 1300 for journal articles, and up to € 6000 for monographs.
- Costs for OA publishing in hybrid OA journals will generally not be reimbursed (contrary to costs for hybrid publishing of monographs).
More information
- Open Access on the BELSPO website
- BELSPO Open Access Policy
Horizon 2020
Horizon 2020 has an Open Access mandate for peer-reviewed publications.
Note that more specific Open Access guidelines apply to H2020 projects working on Covid-19, SARS-CoV-2 and related topics.
Scope
The Horizon 2020 Open Access obligation applies to
- All beneficiaries of Horizon 2020 funding
- Published results arising from that Horizon 2020 funding
- Peer-reviewed scientific publications only
OA route
Horizon 2020 mandates the 'green' route to OA:
- Beneficiaries are required to deposit a machine-readable copy of the published version (Version of Record) or Author's Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version of their publications in a publications repository (such as Ghent University's Biblio).
- They must deposit publications as soon as possible, and at the latest upon publication.
- They have to ensure OA to deposited publications.
- They have to ensure OA to the bibliographic metadata of deposited publications via the repository (metadata of publications deposited in Biblio are publicly accessible!)
The mandate does not preclude direct OA publishing.
Publications published directly in OA, however, must still be deposited in a repository to ensure long-term preservation.
In addition, beneficiaries should aim to deposit at the same time the research data needed to validate the results of deposited publications, ideally in a data repository.
Embargo
- Beneficiaries have to provide immediate OA to deposited publications published directly in OA, i.e. at the time of first publication.
- They have to provide OA to any other deposited publications after a maximum embargo period of 12 months (social sciences and humanities) or 6 months (other disciplines).
Licences
Horizon 2020 has no hard requirements on licences for publications made available in OA.
Beneficiaries are encouraged to use CC licences (e.g. CC BY) or similar licences for providing OA to their publications.
OA publishing costs
- Costs associated with OA publishing are eligible for reimbursement during the lifetime of the project.
- OA publishing costs incurred after completion of a project cannot be reimbursed from that project's budget.
More information
- European Commission, Annotated Model Grant Agreement, Article 29.2
- Open Access section in H2020 Online Manual
Horizon Europe
Horizon Europe has an OA mandate for peer-reviewed publications that follows the principles of Plan S.
Scope
The Horizon Europe Open Access obligation applies to
- All beneficiaries of Horizon Europe funding
- Published results arising from that Horizon Europe funding
- Peer-reviewed scientific publications only (journal articles as well as long-text formats, such as monographs and other types of books)
Beneficiaries are encouraged to also provide OA to publications that are not peer-reviewed.
OA route
Horizon Europe mandates the 'green' route to OA:
- Beneficiaries are required to deposit a machine-readable copy of the published version (Version of Record) or Author's Accepted Manuscript (AAM) version of their publications in a trusted repository (such as Ghent University's Biblio).
- They have to deposit publications at the latest at the time of publication.
- They have to ensure OA to deposited publications via the repository.
- Via the repository they also have to provide information about any research output or any other tools and instruments needed to validate the conclusions of scientific publications. Where applicable, metadata of deposited publications must include persistent identifiers for such outputs, tools, and instruments.
- Metadata of deposited publications must be open (metadata in Biblio are publicly accessible!).
The mandate does not preclude direct OA publishing.
Publications in an OA publishing venue must, however, still be deposited in and made openly accessible via a trusted repository.
Embargo
No embargoes are allowed: Horizon Europe requires immediate OA to publications via the repository, i.e. at the time of first publication.
Licences
Specific licences are required to provide Open Access to publications and their metadata:
- Scientific publications must be licenced under CC BY or an equivalent licence.
- CC BY-NC, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC-ND or an equivalent licence are allowed for monographs and other long-text formats
- CC0 (Public Domain Dedication) or equivalent is required for metadata of deposited publications (metadata licences will be determined by the repository)
Rights retention
Beneficiaries/authors authors must retain sufficient rights to comply with Horizon Europe's OA requirements.
- Best practice is for authors to not transfer copyright to publishers, but to grant them a non-exclusive licence to publish. In this way, authors can use and reuse their own work after publication.
- In any case, authors must retain at least the right to make the AAM version of their publication available in OA via a repository, with zero embargo and under the required licence.
The European Commission recommends authors who publish in non-OA venues to
-
Notify publishers of their prior OA obligations under the Horizon Europe grant agreement at submission stage, by adding a statement to their manuscript
For example: "This work was funded by the Εuropean Union under the Horizon Europe grant [grant number]. As set out in the Grant Agreement, beneficiaries must ensure that at the latest at the time of publication, open access is provided via a trusted repository to the published version or the final peer-reviewed manuscript accepted for publication under the latest available version of the Creative Commons Attribution International Public Licence (CC BY) or a licence with equivalent rights. CC BY-NC, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC-ND or equivalent licenses could be applied to long-text formats". (EC, Horizon Europe Programme Guide, p. 48)
-
Negotiate the terms of the publishing agreement if it is not compatible with the grant agreement's OA obligations
-
Consider an alternative publishing venue/option if the publisher's terms breach the grant agreement
OA publishing costs
- Costs associated with publishing in full OA publishing venues are eligible for reimbursement during the lifetime of the project, but need to be included in the project proposal's budget.
- Not eligible are costs for publishing an in a hybrid OA publishing venue, which combines subscription/payment access and optional OA against payment of a fee.
- Beneficiaries can make use of Open Research Europe (ORE), the European Commission's OA publishing platform that does not charge publishing fees.
More information
- European Commission, Horizon Europe Programme Guide (Open Science section from page 37)
- European Commission, Annotated Model Grant Agreement
Not sure if your intended publishing venue supports compliance with Heu OA requirements?
European Research Council (ERC)
OA requirements for ERC-funded research are embedded in the ERC grant agreement. They depend on the Framework Programme (and sometimes the ERC call) through which funding is obtained:
- See Horizon 2020
- See Horizon Europe
More information
- Open Science on the ERC website
- ERC, Open Access Guidelines for research results funded by the ERC (December 2021)