Page:Open access and the humanities - contexts, controversies and the future.pdf/100

 there are fewer large academic publishers, or at least that there is a perception that this is the case, in France than elsewhere, which also contributes to a greater decentralisation in French research dissemination. There has been concern in the country over how OA might affect French-language journals, as these are less likely to attract international support. That said, as covered below, France is home to the OpenEdition platform, which is a pioneer in trialling freemium models for gold OA.

Roberto di Lauro, the Scientific Attaché in the Italian Embassy, London, reported that, as of 7 October 2013, Italian law dictates that any material supported by public funds that appears in a journal with at least two issues published per year must be made open access through either the gold or the green route. For green OA an embargo of up to twenty-four months is allowed in humanities disciplines. A more recent call for research proposals at the national level halved the allowable embargo period and made compliance a condition of funding. Likewise, in Denmark there is a new commitment to achieving open access to 80% of articles produced in Danish research institutions by 2017 and 100% by 2022, primarily through the green route.86

OA in Japan is also well under way, with the infrastructure provided by the National Institute of Informatics. The green and gold routes are given equal weighting here although funds from national funding agencies are allowed to be spent on APCs. There are nearly 300 institutional repositories although a challenge remains in the digitisation of Japanese-language publications.

The Netherlands, home to the OAPEN project – a key early player in the OA books scene, as covered below – has been committed, since November 2013, to a three-year transition to gold OA, according to Jos Engelen of the Netherlands National Organisation for Scientific Research. The country is currently (May 2014) in an awareness-raising phase while developing mechanisms for reporting. If it is deemed that there has not been enough voluntary progress by 2016, the government intends to put in place legislation to mandate OA, although the details of such a move have not been discussed in detail.

In the United States, as reported by Neil Thakur of the National Institute of Health and the Department of Health and Human