We will work to ensure that access to Danish university research is as open as possible, so that the research can benefit society freely and unhindered, says the organisation.

2020.11.12

By Dean Lars Bo Nielsen, Aarhus University and Pro-rector Peter Kjær, Roskilde University. Chair and vice-chair of the Research Policy Committee, Universities Denmark – 30 October 2020.

Right now all over the world research is being carried out into Covid-19-related questions. The spread of the virus, risk factors, delayed complications, mortality, treatments, containment strategies and vaccines. Working across borders and nationalities, researchers are searching for answers to the questions which are imperative for our chances of stopping the epidemic.

With a global research community of several million researchers, the chances of finding the necessary answers are significantly greater if we build on the knowledge and experience of other researchers, rather than rushing up the same dead ends. The best way to do this is by publishing and reading research results in recognised scientific journals – simply and openly.

Locked behind publishers’ paywalls

The scientific journals are where we as researchers have the opportunity to access and learn from the latest results in the area that we work with, and where we can share our own results so that they can be verified in a broader research community. When we can openly share data and results, we can verify treatments, develop effective vaccines and support and qualify political decisions and guidelines more quickly.

Unfortunately, far too much of the publicly-funded research is currently locked behind the paywalls of scientific publishers. Universities, companies and other organisations that need to draw on the latest research results must pay for increasingly expensive licenses to access research publications and databases.

Each year, Denmark pays around DKK 300 million to scientific publishers for licences to publications and databases. That corresponds to around 560 PhD fellowships. So the publishers ensure they are very well paid for providing universities and researchers with access to the latest research published in scientific journals. It can seem quite absurd that commercial interests should stand in the way of the free sharing of knowledge which would otherwise benefit the whole world.

There is, of course, a form of reasonableness in publishers being paid for the work they do in organising and distributing scientific publishing, but over the last decades there has been a pronounced price increase which now averages three to four per cent annually. This is paradoxical when most of the content of the scientific journals has been delivered and edited for free with the help of the international research community, which must then subsequently pay for expensive licenses to access the articles – or high fees for extracting them from the publishers' paywalls.

It is extremely problematic that Danish taxpayers have to pay an ever increasing amount so that society can gain access to the results that the researchers generate – particularly when we see there is a steadily increasing need for access to global knowledge.

The university’s research is for the benefit of society – not for profit. We will therefore work to ensure that access to Danish university research is as open as possible, so that the research can benefit society freely and unhindered. This is in the best interests of the whole world.