The Access to Research for Development and Innovation (ARDI) program provides free online access to major scientific and technical journals to local, not-for-profit institutions in least-developed countries and low-cost access to industrial property offices in developing countries across the world.

Publishers provide free online access

The ARDI program was launched in 2009 by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in cooperation with 12 major publishers:

• American Association for the Advancement of Science
• American Institute of Physics
• Elsevier
• Institute of Physics
• John Wiley & Sons
• Oxford University Press
• National Academy of Sciences
• Nature Publishing Group
• Royal Society of Chemistry
• Sage Publications
• Springer Science+Business Media
• Taylor & Francis

These 12 publishers provide currently access, through the ARDI program, to over 200 journals for 107 developing countries. Consult the list of ARDI journals

For which countries?

Local, not-for-profit academic and research institutions and national intellectual property offices in two groups of countries may register for access to resources made available through ARDI.

The groups of countries are generally based on three factors: gross national income (GNI) per capita, Human Development Index (HDI) figures, and United Nations Least Developed Country (LDC) status.

For institutions based in Group A countries, access through ARDI is free. For institutions based in Group B countries, access through ARDI is available for 1000 US dollars per institution per calendar year (from January through December). Institutions based in Group B countries may benefit from a six-month free trial period.

Go to the list of eligible countries

Research4Life partnership

In October 2011, ARDI announced that it had joined the Research4Life partnership, a programme that includes three United Nations Agencies: WHO, FAO and UNEP (and their partners). Research4Life provides access to:

• HINARI, Access to Research in Health Programme
• AGORA, Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture
• OARE, Online Access to Research in the Environment

ARDI brings to the Research4Life partnership not only WIPO’s expertise and resources in the area of knowledge infrastructure, including its powerful free PATENTSCOPE patent search service, but also a growing network of Technology and Innovation Support Centers (TISCs) based in universities and research centers around the world, whose trained staff support local users in effectively accessing and exploiting technological knowledge. By joining Research4Life, ARDI became the fourth programme in the partnership.