China to support open access in a big way by adopting Plan S

Major funders and librarians in China have stated their intent to support and join Plan S, an initiative by a group of European funders to ensure that by 2020 all publicly funded research outcome is made freely accessible upon publication.

According to an article published in Nature, several key institutes in China such as National Science Library (NSL), National Science and Technology Library (NSTL), and Natural Science Foundation have declared their support for Plan S. In response to this, Robert-Jan Smits, the mastermind behind Plan S, said, “We knew China was reflecting to join us — but that it would join as so soon and unambiguously is an enormous surprise.”

Xiaolin Zhang, who chairs the Strategic Planning Committee of NSTL at the Ministry of Science and Technology in Beijing, has confirmed that the outcome of all publicly funded Chinese research will be publicly available as soon as China adopts Plan S. He added that, “Any notion that open access has little traction in China is misleading.” Although most of the research in China is behind paywalls, Zhang believes that this is set to change. He indicated that China would even try to strike “read and publish” deals with publishers to facilitate the accessibility of Chinese academics to scientific literature.

For many publishers, China’s position regarding open access was unexpected. “We were under the impression that open access isn’t quite as urgent an issue in China as it is in Europe and the United States. If it is indeed, we are more than happy to engage,” said Daniel Ropers, chief executive officer of Springer Nature.  

Awareness about open access is growing in China. And while Chinese academics seem keen on supporting this movement, some researchers are concerned about how Plan S will change the publishing landscape. Since publishing in paywalled journals and even some hybrid journals would no longer be an option if their research is being federally funded, researchers will have to choose journals cautiously.

As of now, China has not shared a date by when the new policies consistent with Plan S will be implemented and whether they will be followed stringently.

Related reading:

• Swedish consortium refuses to renew contract with Elsevier as Europe's move toward OA gains momentum
• German institutions push Elsevier for a fair deal in order to access paywalled research