Michael Smith Foundation adopts strong OA policy

As reported by Jim Till on Be Openly Accessible or Be Obscure, the Michael Smith Foundation, a medical research funding agency funded by the British Columbia government, has adopted an open access policy - and a strong one, that I hope will be a model for other funding agencies.

Excerpt from Jim Till's blog:

On July 6, 2009, the Board of Directors of the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research (MSFHR), adopted an Open Access to Research Outputs Policy [see 2-page PDF]. The MSFHR is the provincial support agency for health research in British Columbia (BC, Canada) and is funded by the Government of BC. A pivotal paragraph of the policy statement is also available at Managing Your Award [from the MSFHR]:

All MSFHR Award Recipients who receive an award or an award renewal after July 7, 2009 must ensure that all final peer-reviewed journal manuscripts that arise from research supported by that award (in whole or in part) are made freely accessible through either the Publisher’s website or an online repository within six months of publication.

This post is part of the Canadian Leadership in the Open Access Movement series. Now that the Open Access Tracking Project is up and running, there is a much easier for us all to track progress in Canada - simply sign up for a free Connotea account, and tag any news with oa.new and oa.canada.