It came as a bit of a surprise for Executive Board president Gerard Meijer when the European Ministers of Research and Innovation announced their decision to enforce the open access publication of all European articles in 2020. 'This important milestone was achieved in part thanks to Dutch efforts.'

Open access publication is heading in the right direction in the Netherlands: more than thirty percent of all scientific articles are published in journals accessible to everyone – a percentage that has grown considerably in the past three years. ‘We are pioneers in this arena, alongside Austria, Finland and the Max Planck Society in Germany’, says Gerard Meijer, who entered into open access negotiations with publisher Elsevier on behalf of the Association of Universities in the Netherlands (VSNU). ‘But the rest of Europe was biding its time, so I was a little surprised by this news.’

Last week, the EU Ministers of Research and Innovation decided that all European publications financed with public funds must be accessible to everyone by 2020. At the moment, readers pay for the articles they are interested in; however, in 2020, authors will have to pay a so-called article processing charge to have their work published. This will mark the advent of an entirely new business strategy for publishers.

‘I am convinced that this decision will be extremely advantageous in the long run.’

State Secretary Sander Dekker expressed a similar sentiment in a letter to parliament in the autumn of 2013. ‘That letter had more influence than I thought at the time’, says Meijer. ‘Apparently, an issue like this has to be discussed at a higher level. Secretary Dekker’s letter caught the attention of the VSNU, which had no other choice than to address it. It quickly became apparent that it is indeed possible to make agreements with publishers about open access. It may not be easy and it may require a bit of a push at times, but it is possible.’

Advantages
Because of this success, the Netherlands managed to follow through on a Europe-wide open access deal. ‘During his EU presidency, Secretary Dekker made it his mission to get this decision approved. This is a real milestone for European science. Researchers want to be read and cited as much as possible. I’m convinced that this decision will be extremely advantageous in the long run.’