Centering the Knowledge Periphery through Open Access

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Centering the Knowledge Periphery through Open
Access
ARL Membership Meeting The International
Dimensions of Digital Science and
Scholarship Ottawa, Canada May 17-19, 2006
Leslie ChanBioline International International
Studies and New Media studies University of
Toronto at Scarborough
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Issues

• Current state of knowledge production and access
  to knowledge in the developing world
• Will Open Access bridge the knowledge gap between
  the North and the South?
• Lessons from Bioline International

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Arthur J. Carty National Science Advisor to the
Prime Minister International Association of
Technological University Libraries, Quebec 31 May
2005
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Challenges
African countries need to have in place
appropriate mechanisms and infrastructure for
training and exploitation of knowledge. This will
enable them to make meaningful evidence-based
policy, in order adequately to address local
needs and participate in the international
community on science and technology
issues. Network of the African Science
Academies and the science academies from the G8
countries (2005) http//www.scidev.net/pdffiles/jo
intstatement.pdf
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Disparity in scientific output

• The G8 countries account for 85 of most cited
  articles indexed in ISI
• The other 126 countries (mostly in the developing
  world) account for 2.5 (King, 2004)

But ISIs Science Citation Index has serious
biases
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Dominant Model of Knowledge Dissemination
From the Centre
to Periphery
HINARI/ AGORA
invisible knowledge
Perpetual the cycle of poverty and dependence
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The 10-90 Gap

• 10 of the global health research spending is
  allocated to diseases affecting 90 of the world
  population
• So how relevant is scientific knowledge generated
  in the North for health and development in the
  developing world?

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Lown and Banerjee (2006) The Developing World in
The NJM
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Flow of information

• North to South is important for South
• South to South is also important as contexts are
  more relevant
• Is South to North important for North?
• Definitely yes
• Tropical and infectious diseases including
  HIV/AIDS, malaria, etc.
• Alternative including herbal medicine
• Epidemiological data
• Epidemics and new diseases
• Biodiversity for global understanding

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International collaboration

• International collaborations result in higher
  citation impact
• What about researchers in the developing
  countries?

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Journals from developing world
Limited circulation
Poor visibility and readership
Fewer authors and subscriptions
Circle oflimitedaccessibility
Limited recognition Fewer citations
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Dominant Model of Knowledge Dissemination
From the Centre
to Periphery
invisible knowledge
Stopping the cycle of poverty and dependence
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Open access enable Peer-to-Peer sharing
and new model of Knowledge creation, Sharing,
and Dissemination
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But need to better understand

• Barriers to
• access
• Modes of
• knowledge creation
• Cultures of
• sharing

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Bioline International
http//www.bioline.org.br
the small deal
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What is Bioline International?

• Electronic aggregator of full text journals from
  developing countries
• OAI data provider
• Serve as open access platform for journals
  without the necessary infrastructure
• A South-North collaboration

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Bioline International

• Development - using open source software and open
  standards
• Advocacy - Aims to influence scholarly
  communication practices and access to research
  literature
• Research - Will open access improve the
  visibility and impact of journals from developing
  countries? How effective are research libraries
  in enabling international collaboration?

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Core Partners
EPT, UK
UT, Canada
CRIA, Brazil http//www.cria.org.br
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Funding Support

• University of Toronto Libraries
• Department of Social Sciences, U of T at
  Scarborough
• Open Society Institute, Information Access Program

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Publishing Partners

• Scholarly and Scientific societies from 17
  countries
• Research centres in biology and medicine,
  university-based publications,
• All non-profit and willing to experiment with
  free online access
• Most are supported by local subsidies and
  international aids

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Meta-data exchange and dissemination partners

• Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) -
  http//www.doaj.org/
• The eGranary Digital Library - http//www.widernet
  .org/digitalLibrary/index.htm
• Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative
  (HINARI) - http//www.who.int/hinari/en/
• OAIster.org - http//www.oaister.org/
• Scientific and Technical Information System -
  http//sist-prototype.sist-sciencesdev.net/
• University of Toronto Libraries - T-Space -
  https//tspace.library.utoronto.ca/

New Partnership with SPARC!
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Recent additions

• International Journal of Environment Science and
  Technology (Iran)
• Iranian Journal of Environmental Health, Science
  and Engineering
• African Health Sciences (Uganda)
• Health Policy and Development Journal (Uganda)
• Brazilian Journal of Oral Sciences
• VITAE Academia Biomedica Digital (Venezuela)
• Medical Journal of The Islamic Republic of Iran
• Iranian Journal of Pharmacology and Therapeutics
• Journal of Health, Population and Nutrition
  (Bangladesh)
• African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition
  and Development (Kenya)

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Key events June 2003, full open access
Jan 2005, full OAI compliant
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Increased visibility

• Traditional directories and indexes ( e.g.
  EBSCOs A-Z service, Ulrichs Serials Directory),
  ISI Web Content
• Directory of Open Access Journal (DOAJ), African
  Journal Online (AJOL), Virtual Health Library of
  Latin America and Caribbean (BRIME), Latindex,
  Africa Index Medicus, eGranary Digital
  Library
• Accessibility from library catalogs through
  OpenURL
• Also accessible through HINARI and AGORA

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Journal of Postgraduate Medicine

• Quarterly journal
• Based in Mumbai, India
• Print circulation
• Limited to school
• Paid subscription 100
• Majority from India
• 50-80 articles published / year

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Making more accessible
JPGM at Bioline
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JPGM at OAI server
Archived at multiple places
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JPGM at PubMed
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www.jpgmonline.com
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JPGM at DOAJ
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Circle of Accessibility
Bioline International
SearchEngines
OAI services
e.g. OAIster.org
OAI servers T-Space
JPGM
PubMed
SearchEngines
Library catalogues
Directories e.g. DOAJ
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Downloads and visitors
Data D.K. Sahu
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Geographic distribution of visitors (n 500)
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Article submissions
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International submissions
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Projected Impact Factor
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Economics of OA-P for India
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Effect of OA on subscriptions
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OA as a tool for dissemination
Open access
Increased visibility Larger readership
More authors and other benefits
Wider recognition Increased citations
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Conclusions

• OA is increasing the visibility, accessibility
  and impact of some of the journals from
  developing countries
• Collaboration is key and low cost
• Open linking is crucial
• Need to develop value-added services with OA
  databases and open standards
• Alternative and more inclusive measures of
  research impact is emerging but OA is the
  foundation
• Long term funding is uncertain

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Thank you! Questions?
Please visit http//www.bioline.org.br