The Australian Research Council (ARC) has introduced, with effect from the 1st of January 2013, a new open access policy for all ARC funded research. This policy mandates that all funded research must be deposited into an open access institutional repository within the 12 months period from the date of publication.

 

The Australian Research Council policy joins similar funder mandates such as Welcome Trust,  Department of International Development-UK (DFID), and National Health Institutes; however, the ARC policy has been found weak in (i) enforcing compliancy and (ii) that it does not require grantees to retain the rights needed to authorise open access. Peter Suber, phrased this latter loophole with this cliché, “Make your work OA unless your publisher won't allow it.” 

 

Visit AIMS Open Access pages for a collection of different types OA mandates.