The term “hita-hita” was employed to signify something that penetrates gently and smoothly. As of 2011, a total of 760,000 research papers are accessible through IRs across Japan.

Open Access (OA) is not politically forced at state level or institution level. Instead, a repository manager-level lateral solidarity has been built to share experience, exchange various creative ideas, add improvements and disseminate our ideas, thereby highly developing respective IRs.

This report introduces large and small ideas that have enhanced penetration of the OA movement and developed IRs in Japan, and it also outlines the activities of DRF, which has supported such ideas.