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Achieving Open Access to Conservation Science
| Content Provider | PubMed Central |
|---|---|
| Author | Fuller, Richard A. Lee, Jasmine R. Watson, James E. M. |
| Copyright Year | 2014 |
| Abstract | Conservation science is a crisis discipline in which the results of scientific enquiry must be made available quickly to those implementing management. We assessed the extent to which scientific research published since the year 2000 in 20 conservation science journals is publicly available. Of the 19,207 papers published, 1,667 (8.68%) are freely downloadable from an official repository. Moreover, only 938 papers (4.88%) meet the standard definition of open access in which material can be freely reused providing attribution to the authors is given. This compares poorly with a comparable set of 20 evolutionary biology journals, where 31.93% of papers are freely downloadable and 7.49% are open access. Seventeen of the 20 conservation journals offer an open access option, but fewer than 5% of the papers are available through open access. The cost of accessing the full body of conservation science runs into tens of thousands of dollars per year for institutional subscribers, and many conservation practitioners cannot access pay-per-view science through their workplace. However, important initiatives such as Research4Life are making science available to organizations in developing countries. We urge authors of conservation science to pay for open access on a per-article basis or to choose publication in open access journals, taking care to ensure the license allows reuse for any purpose providing attribution is given. Currently, it would cost $51 million to make all conservation science published since 2000 freely available by paying the open access fees currently levied to authors. Publishers of conservation journals might consider more cost effective models for open access and conservation-oriented organizations running journals could consider a broader range of options for open access to nonmembers such as sponsorship of open access via membership fees. |
| Related Links | http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cobi.12346 |
| Ending Page | 1557 |
| Page Count | 8 |
| Starting Page | 1550 |
| File Format | |
| ISSN | 08888892 |
| e-ISSN | 15231739 |
| Journal | Conservation Biology |
| Issue Number | 6 |
| Volume Number | 28 |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | BlackWell Publishing Ltd |
| Publisher Date | 2014-12-01 |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Rights Holder | BlackWell Publishing Ltd |
| Subject Keyword | Ecology Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics Nature and Landscape Conservation Research in Higher Education |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
| Subject | Ecology Medicine Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics Nature and Landscape Conservation |
