Taylor & Francis Strikes New Open-Access Agreement for African Researchers
Researchers in Namibia, Botswana, and South Africa are set to benefit from a new open-access agreement between Taylor & Francis and the South African National Library and Information Consortium. This transformative agreement, the 14th of its kind, will cover open-access processing charges for more than 2,100 journals over the next three years.
The South African National Library and Information Consortium is known for negotiating collective license agreements with publishers and aggregators to provide scholarly reading and publishing services for its members and beneficiaries.
Under this new agreement, corresponding authors at participating institutions will have the option to choose open access in all Taylor & Francis and Routledge Open Select (hybrid) journals, including UNISA Press and NISC co-published titles. Additionally, researchers opting to publish in full open-access journals can do so at reduced cost with their institutions’ support.
This initiative aims to cover open-access publishing charges for all eligible articles, allowing researchers to maximize the impact of their work by choosing open access. The agreement is expected to be particularly beneficial for researchers in the humanities and social sciences, fields that often face challenges in securing funding for open-access publishing.
Furthermore, the read & publish agreement will grant faculty and students at participating institutions access to over 1,900 journals in the humanities, social sciences, and science and technology.
To support better understanding of publishing and best practices in open research, the Taylor & Francis team will provide an editorial-led program of training and resources for researchers in the region.
Ellen Tise, chair of the South African National Library and Information Consortium board, expressed her enthusiasm for the deal, stating, ‘This deal has enabled South Africa to repurpose read-only subscription expenditures to finance the right for our authors from participating institutions to publish full and immediate open-access in all Taylor & Francis Open Select (hybrid) journals while retaining their copy.’ This move is seen as a significant step in championing diversity and equity in academic publishing.
