Bangladesh: an overview of Open Access (OA) initiatives.
Uddin, Nazim ; Koehlmoos, Tracey Lynn Perez ; Hossain, Shaikh A. Shahed 等
Introduction
Universal access to information and knowledge is the UNESCO's
overall mandate to promote the free flow of information and making
information available at the fingertips of research communities. Open
Access (OA) is an innovative form of scholarly communication within the
digital environment aimed at achievement of universal access to
information and knowledge. OA emerged as an alternative model of
scholarly publishing. This is very much related to serials crisis, the
term serials crisis is used to describe the rising costs of journal
subscriptions during the last several years. As the budget of the
libraries hardly ever rose, hence, a good number of libraries were
obliged to cancel a significant amount of their subscriptions. OA to
knowledge is a model adopted by many International and
Inter-Governmental organizations, such as World Summit on the
Information Society (WSIS), for disseminating full-text contents to
online communities. (1)
OA during last decades, with growth of world population, literacy
and movement, the demand for information and knowledge also increased
exponentially. Similarly, there were simultaneous growth in the
production and supply of information and knowledge. The quantitative
increase in scientific information, had a number of implications, these
included; rapid growth of research articles, rapid growth of specific
journals, increase of prices of these journals, and tight library budget
for purchase of these journals. The impact of increase in prices of
journals has been felt in all countries across the world. (2)
Academic community in general and librarians, particularly, are
concerned about constant increase in the cost of journals year after
year especially in Science, Technology and Medical (STM) titles. The
monopoly of commercial publishers first led to the skyrocketing prices
of print journal subscriptions, then the licensing system for accessing
to electronic resources and collection of electronic publications in
disguise of "big deal", makes it more and more challenging for
libraries to purchase the reading materials are required by libraries to
meet their users' need. At the same time it is also felt that most
of the research are carried out with public money, so public should have
free access to the products, publications of any
institutions/organizations. (3)
Aims of the Paper
The aim of this paper is to examine how the concept of OA movement
and OA initiatives happened, in line context of global access to
information and knowledge in Bangladesh. Also to describe the current
status and progress of OA journals and institutional repositories in
Bangladesh. This will provide an understanding of OA movement in
Bangladesh at the same time will encourage establishment of
institutional repositories and making journals published from Bangladesh
freely available in OA for global research community.
Methodology
In order to get better understanding and clear ideas on OA
initiatives in Bangladesh a comprehensive literature search has been
conducted by the authors of this paper. An exhaustive literature search
has been conducted through Google and Google scholar platform. General
phrase and Boolean search techniques have been applied. The following
search terms were used: "Open Access AND Bangladesh",
"Open Access initiatives AND Bangladesh", "OA AND
Bangladesh", "OA journals", "Role of OA in
library", "OA initiatives AND Bangladesh",
"Institutional repositories AND Bangladesh" etc. In addition,
a variety of grey literature was consulted including different project
proposals, reports, book chapters and conference proceedings and others.
Finally, personal contacts and discussions with scientists, researchers,
and librarians have also been carried out in order to explore
significant information for this study.
Basic Concept of OA
Definition of OA
Peter Suber a dedicated promoter of the OA movement defines OA as
"Open access to scientific articles means online access without
charge to readers or libraries. Committing to open access means
dispensing with the financial, technical and legal barriers that are
designed to limit access to scientific research articles to paying
customers". (4)
Benefits of OA
The OA model promotes free exchange of scholarly publications. It
cut down the costs for libraries, which is very important for developing
countries. Articles published in OA model are free of copyright and
licensing restrictions. In OA model, author retains copyright to his/her
article and gives consents for its availability in OA, thereby removing
all legal barriers that exist in commercial publications. Researchers in
developing countries will benefit the most from OA to the scholarly
literature. OA model offers an opportunity for searching,
cross-searching, citation analysis, and other value-added services such
as monitoring and measuring impact, productivity and quality. (5)
OA (OA) journals
Open-access journals are treated as "golden route' for
providing access to peer-reviewed journal literature in electronic
format free of charge without any restrictions. Publishers of OA use all
the traditional processes of commercially-produced journals except for
charging subscription for their journals. (6)
Self-Archiving, Institutional Repositories (IR)
The term "self-archiving" is important for OA as it
refers to the process where individual authors submit their own papers
into an institutional repository. Institutional repositories often
referred to as "green route" to OA publishing, which is
popular to provide OA to scholarly literature. (7)
Major OA Publishers
Some of the important OA publishers are given in the below table.
ICT Scenario of Bangladesh
The advancement of science and technology has made a remarkable
enhancement and changed almost all spheres of life. Especially,
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has been revolutionized
in all corners of the global arena and incorporated in the sectors of
education, organizations, communication, and government & corporate
offices and others. The services render with the help of ICT are faster
and more effective. The term "ICT" describes the use of
computer-based technology and the Internet to make information and
communication services available to a wide range of users. ICT makes it
possible to capture, store, manipulate, and distribute information in a
number of formats including text, images, sound, and video and introduce
new services, revitalize the existing services by providing faster
access to the resources. ICT infrastructure is very important for open
access initiatives for any country. OA is fully dependent on the
effective use and application of ICT. ICT is the backbone of OA
activities which not only harbor the OA movement but also propagates its
growth and future development. With advanced ICT infrastructure the
development of OA increases many folds.
Overall situation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT)
in Bangladesh is poor. Public access to global network and information
is extremely limited due to economic condition of Bangladesh, where as
the per capita income of Bangladesh is Taka 57652 (U$ 742) in 2011 and
real GDP growth is 6.66%. (8)
Infrastructure of ICT in Bangladesh is weak. Overall, Bangladesh
ranks 118 among 133 countries, which is worse than most of its South
Asian counterparts in the ICT sector. India, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan
rank higher than Bangladesh. Bangladesh's low ranking on
infrastructure is due to factors such as low level of secure internet
servers, lack of widespread and consistent electricity supply and low
Internet bandwidth. Bangladesh is ranked as one of the lowest in the
world (130), in human resource capacity, i.e. in terms of investment by
companies in staff training and employee development. (9)
ICT initiatives taken by the present Government:
The 2008 elections in Bangladesh brought in a new government with a
broad platform to reduce poverty as well as improve governance, rule of
law and citizen's access to government services. "Digital
Bangladesh" has been proclaimed a high priority of the Government
in the pre-election manifesto. ICT is the backbone of any digital
initiative. ICT covers the vast area of information technology,
communication technology and of course the telecommunication technology;
categorically processing of information and ensuring connectivity. Again
it is mentionable that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina dreamed for a
Digital Bangladesh. Without ICT sector development the dream of a
Digital Bangladesh would be only a dream for the total nation.
Bangladesh enters 3G era
On 14 October 2012, Teletalk Bangladesh Limited (a public limited
company) launched 3G (Third Generation) services for the first time in
Bangladesh in order to build "Digital Bangladesh" in enhancing
the participatory role of Teletalk. (10) Grameenphone, Robi, Airtel and
Banglalink, four other telecom operators in Bangladesh, also ioined 3G
mobile and internet services recently with the holding of the
country's biggest auction to make a new advanced mobile service
available for the first time in Bangladesh enabling fast spread of
mobile internet. Grameenphone, Robi, Airtel and Banglalink acquired 25
megahertz spectrum at a cost of $525 million or Tk 40.81 billion through
auction process for 3G mobile phone service operation in the country. Of
the 40 megahertz (MHz) spectrum of 2100 band, Grameenphone vied for 10
MHz spectrum, while Robi, Airtel and Banglalink for 5 MHz spectrum each.
The rest 15 MHz spectrum has remained unsold. The base price of per MHz
spectrum was $20 million and every incremental bid call was set at $1.0
million. (11)
Some achievements of the present Government
There are some achievements achieved by the present Government is
mentioned below:
* Mobile phone based medical advice from qualified doctors (from 64
district hospitals and 418 Upazilla hospitals) free of charge on 24/7
basis.
* Remote online telemedicine from Community clinics to Upazilla
Hospitals
* Dissemination of health care information via SMS to citizens
* Remote phone consultation with doctors provided by all telecom
operators
* SMS and email based public exam results
* Online students registration for SSC/HS C students
* E-books of all public school books made available online
* Online student admission by some colleges under National
University
* SMS based registration for public universities admission test,
and SMS based dissemination of exam results
* ICT enabled innovative class room proiect in collaboration with
Microsoft
* Union Information and Service Centres
* Website for National Infokosh
* SMS-Based Utility Bill Payment
* Dhaka City Corporation Call Centre
* National Web Portal: The National Web Portal
(www.bangladesh.gov.bd) is a citizen-centric gateway for all government
information and services that can be accessed electronically. The
website is positioned as the online one-stop shop for all government
eServices and is providing information on the most popular citizen
services, the basic information of the structure of Bangladesh
Government, current news, upcoming events and other important
information and links to all government ministries, divisions and
departments.
* Single Website with Downloadable Forms: This website
(www.forms.gov.bd) reduces time and cost to access forms from many
different organs of the government.
* Agricultural Radio and TV Shows
* Internet Connectivity at Upazilla Health Complex
OA movement in Bangladesh
The concept of OA movement in Bangladesh is being developed based
on reducing the huge pressure of library budget for subscription to
journals. A few libraries in Bangladesh subscribe journals for their
respective libraries. OA movement in Bangladesh is very slow and rate of
progress of OA is very low.
First OA movement in Bangladesh started from icddr,b by making
publicly available icddr,b Journal of Diarrhoeal Disease Research (JDDR)
in 1997, later the Journal of Health, Population, and Nutrition (JHPN)
in 2000, and then building an Institutional Repositories (IR) in 2005.
Till now five initiatives are taken for building Institutional
Repositories in Bangladesh, one is by icddr,b and the others are by BRAC
University, Independent University Bangladesh, Daffodil International
University, and East West University. There are some other universities,
public and private both, are trying to develop IR in their respective
universities. However, currently, OA with some exceptions is available
in Bangladesh through both golden and green routes.
Golden route is where the author or author's institution can
pay a fee to the publisher at publication time, the publisher thereafter
making the material available 'free' at the point of access
(the 'gold' route) to journal articles. Green route is where
the author can self-archive at the time of submission of the publication
(the 'green' route) whether the publication is grey literature
(usually internal non-peer-reviewed), a peer-reviewed journal
publication, a peer-reviewed conference proceedings paper or a
monograph. Institutional repository of icddr,b and Journal of Health,
Population and Nutrition (JHPN) can be referred as green route and gold
route respectively.
Per Capita Income Model Open Access HINARI: Experiences from
Bangladesh
HINARI has divided into two groups of countries, i.e. band 1 and
band 2, for getting access to HINARI resources based on per capita
income (World Bank figures). The institutions, working as
not-for-profit, of these countries may register for access to the
journals through HINARI. Institutions in countries with GNI (Gross
National Income) per capita below $1600 are eligible for free access.
Institutions in countries with GNI per capita between $1601- $4700,
those institutions should pay a fee of $1000 per year/ institution. (12)
Bangladesh categorized as low income country as per World Bank
classification is entitled to free access to HINARI. Bangladesh falls in
group/band 1.
The collective name for four programmes--HINARI, AGORA, OARE and
ARDI--or Research4Life provides developing countries with free or low
cost access to academic and professional peer-reviewed content online.
The concept of Research4Life is simple: research in health, agriculture,
development and innovation, and the environment are better informed when
these are based on the most recent, high quality and relevant scientific
knowledge. Research4Life applies this delivering knowledge to the
world's poorest countries. Research4Life is empowering
universities, colleges, research institutes and government ministries as
well as non-governmental agencies and hospitals, with access to
scientific knowledge that was never before imagined. The Health
InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI) plays a significant
role to provide free or very low cost online access to the maior
journals in biomedical and related social sciences to local,
not-for-profit institutions in developing countries. In 2013, there are
more than 5,300 institutions in more than 100 eligible countries, areas
and territories registered for HINARI. Up to 12,700 Journals (in 30
different languages), up to 24,900 e-books, up to 70 other information
resources are now available to health institutions in more than 100
countries, areas and territories benefiting many thousands of health
workers and researchers, and in turn, contributing to improve world
health. At present, the total number of participating organizations from
Bangladesh are registered with HINARI is about 260.
On 4th January 2011 the four publishers i.e. American Association
for the Advancement of Science, American Society for Animal Science,
Elsevier Science, and Thomson Scientific (Current contents only) blocked
their access to HINARI for Bangladesh. Although, HINARI has given
information in their announcement that the Springer and Lippincott
Williams Wilkins also blocked their access to HINARI for Bangladesh. In
fact, Springer and Lippincott Williams Wilkins withdrew their access
from HINARI program in 2006 and 2008 respectively. So, these two
publishers already blocked their access few years back, not in 2011.
This blockade created a massive blow for the users of Bangladesh,
particularly icddr,b researchers as icddr,b is one of the top most
HINARI users in Bangladesh. The blockade hampered normal research
activities in icddr,b as the researchers had access to 1,610 full-text
journals obstructed by Elsevier Science. Scientists and researchers of
icddr,b faced challenges in retrieving information for their research
work as they do their research in a developing country like Bangladesh
with a limited resources. Library services of icddr,b were severely
affected by this blockade and Librarians also faced problems in
providing services to researchers. In this situation, one of the former
senior health system scientists of icddr,b Dr. Tracey Lynn Perez
Koehlmoos (co-author of this article) and Dr. Richard Smith former
editor of BMJ started campaigning through HIFA 2015 List Serve Group
against that decision and described the situation as "very
discouraging" as there was not even access of their own papers and
also shared their views with other research communities of the world. As
an outcome, one editorial (13) and one statement of Elsevier (14)
published in the Lancet, one feature was published in PLoS Medicine,
(15) and also news was published in British Medical Journal. (16) Thanks
to the efforts of these two scientists, that immediately drew attention
to the concerned publishers, editors of major journals, researchers and
other users from around the globe. Elsevier made a statement in the
Lancet regarding the blockade. Adverse reactions were shown from
research community of Bangladesh for the blockade. In the mean time
American Association for the Advancement of Science withdrew their
blockade.
Finally, great publisher Elsevier Science turned back to HINARI on
19th January 2011. Also Lippincott Williams Wilkins reopened access of
their journals through HINARI in March 2011. It may also be mentioned
here that a significant journal title the Lancet is now available online
through OA from Bangladesh. Dr. Tracey Lynn Perez Koehlmoos and Dr.
Richard Smith played an important role in returning back Elsevier
Science, with full text journals of Elsevier, to HINARI platform
applicable for Bangladesh. There are almost 260 organizations,
registered with HINARI programme, of Bangladesh got relief from the
struggling of accessing to more than 2000 full text journals of
Elsevier. It helps Bangladesh a lot.
OA Repositories in Bangladesh
icddr,b, for the first time in Bangladesh, is established its IR in
2005. Then it is followed by BRAC University in 2008. (17) Recently,
Independent University Bangladesh, Daffodil International University,
and East West University leading private universities in Bangladesh, are
now working on IR using DSpace software. Bangabandhu Sheikh Muiib
Medical University (BSMMU) is making an attempt to set up an IR in their
Library. In December 2011, BSMMU organized a two-day-long training
course on DSpace for building institutional repositories in different
universities of Bangladesh with the financial support of University
Grants Commission (UGC) of Bangladesh. Some features of IR in Bangladesh
are given below.
International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research Digital
Repository, Bangladesh (icddr,b)
Organisation: International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research,
Bangladesh
Description: This is a subject repository providing access to
research into Diarrhoeal Disease, Population sciences, Poverty and
health, Child health, Clinical sciences, HIV/AIDS, Gender, Health and
family planning system and Nutrition. Some items are only available to
registered users.
OAI-PMH: http://dspace.icddrb.org/dspace-oai/request
Software: DSpace
Collection Size: 4397 items (September 15, 2013)
Subjects: Biology and Biochemistry; Nutrition; Cholera; Diarrhoeal
Diseases; HIV/AIDS; Population; Infectious diseases; Chronic Diseases;
Environment; Public Health; Health and Medicine; Library and Information
Science
Content: Articles; Conferences; Special reports
Languages: English
Remarks: Special items include Research Protocols
Source: http://dspace.icddrb.org/dspace/
Independent University, Bangladesh (lUB) Institutional Repository
Organisation: Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB)
Description: The purpose of this repository is to collect,
preserve, and distribute digital materials of IUB. Repositories are
important tools for preserving an organization's legacy; they
facilitate digital preservation and scholarly communication.
Software: DSpace
Collection Size: 101 items (September 15, 2013)
Subjects: Multidisciplinary
Content: Articles; Conference papers; Theses; Books; Reports;
Unpublished gray literature
Languages: English
Source: http://dir.iub.edu.bd:8081/
Eat West University Institutional Repository
Organisation: Eat West University, Bangladesh
Description: The main obiective of this repository to collect,
preserves, and disseminates/distributes digital materials among the
information seekers as well as the EWU community. This is an important
tools for facilitating digital preservation and scholarly communication.
Software: DSpace
Collection Size: 35 items (September 15, 2013)
Subjects: Multidisciplinary
Content: Articles; Conference papers; Theses; Books; Reports;
Unpublished gray literature
Languages: English
Source: http://dspace.ewubd.edu:8080/
Daffodil International University Institutional Repository
Organisation: Daffodil International University, Bangladesh
Software: DSpace
Collection Size: 396 items (September 15, 2013)
Subjects: Multidisciplinary
Content: Articles; Conference papers; Theses; Books; Reports;
Unpublished gray literature
Languages: English
Source: http ://dspace.daffodilvarsity.edu.bd:8080/
BRAC University Institutional Repository
Organisation: BRAC University, Bangladesh
Description: This site provides access to the output of the
institution. The interface is in English. The Digital Institutional
Repository program is funded by the International Network for the
Availability of Scientific Publications (INASP).
Software: DSpace
Collection Size: 2005 items (September 15, 2013)
Subjects: Multidisciplinary
Content: Articles; Conferences; Theses; Unpublished gray
literature; Books
Languages: English
Source: http://dspace.bracu.ac.bd/
OA journals in Bangladesh
BanglaJOL is a database of journals published in Bangladesh,
covering the full range of academic disciplines. The objective of
BanglaJOL is to give greater visibility to the participating journals,
and to the research they convey.
The project BanglaJOL, supported by INASP, was initiated in June
2007 and officially launched in September 2007 for making Bangladeshi
journals publicly available through OA. It aims to promote the awareness
and use of Bangladesh-published journals in all disciplines by providing
access to tables of contents (TOCs), abstracts and full text on the
Internet. BanglaJOL uses the Open Journals System created by the Public
Knowledge Project based in Canada. BanglaJOL is grateful to RDMFA for
their support of this project. The Editing and Publishing Association of
Bangladesh has also provided valuable support and management of the
service. (18)
At present BanglaJOL plays a significant role in making Bangladeshi
journals available through OA. BanglaJOL is financed by INASP/RDMFA and
INASP is funded by other agencies. There is growing concern of
sustaining BanglaJOL activities if INASP fund stops. So it is becoming
apparent that initiatives are needed to create a platform from where OA
journals will be published from Bangladesh on a regular basis or to
secure additional fund sources to continue BanglaJOL current activities
either from public sources or through any joint efforts of all
concerned.
[GRAPHIC OMITTED]
Directory of OA Journals (DOAJ):
The aim of the Directory of OA Journals is to increase the
visibility and ease of use of OA scientific and scholarly journals. The
Directory covers 30 (19) scientific and scholarly journals published
from Bangladesh. There are many journals published from Bangladesh not
included in DOAJ. Bangladesh OA journals have only 1.18% share that are
available in BanglaJOL platform compared to the DOAJ OA journals
globally. Bangladesh covers one of the small segments of OA journals
considering OA journals available in the world (Chart 1 above).
Barriers of OA in Bangladesh
Barriers of OA are as follows:
i) Lack of financial support for managing OA journals.
ii) Lack of awareness amongst authors/researchers/scientists about
benefits of depositing their work in OA repositories.
iii) Attitudes of authors are not positive towards publishing their
research papers.
iv) Scientists/writers are not aware or properly informed of this
movement.
v) Publishers are not properly informed about this OA movement.
vi) The publisher's willingness to adopt OA for the fear that
they would not be able to recover the cost of their publishing process
or generate a sufficient surplus.
vii) Lack of awareness amongst authors/researchers/scientists about
benefits of depositing their work in OA repositories.
viii) Acceptance of articles submitted in OA repositories as
equivalent to the traditional journals for promotion and tenure jobs.
Findings
Understanding, perception, and awareness of OA in Bangladesh are
still low. Developed countries, scientifically advanced nations, have
already acknowledged the benefits of OA and are making fast growth in
publishing journals through OA and building institutional repositories.
At this stage, Bangladesh is not up to the mark in terms of having only
five institutional repositories and these five repositories are managed
by an international research organization and four private universities
in Bangladesh. Considering, there are currently, 110 universities in
Bangladesh that includes public, private and international. (20) Till
now there is no public university that maintains institutional
repository in Bangladesh. Out of 73 private universities, only four
universities maintain IR in their respective institution. Since these
four university librarians take the initiatives to establish IR in their
institution, of course, with the support of university management.
It is understood that the authorities don't feel any
obligation to establish IR. First of all authorities don't have any
idea on IR and OA. There are three reasons, i.e. lack of fund, awareness
and professional librarian, public university management can't move
forward for establishing IR and OA. In private sector, private
university management, with some exceptions, are not willing to invest
money in developing modern libraries using advanced technologies that
affects the development of IR and OA in their respective institution.
Libraries are the most-affected victim of the current model of
scholarly publications. With dramatic increase in number of research
publications and steep increase in their cost, the libraries are no
longer in a position to acquire research publications they require for
satisfying needs of their users. For the greater interest of libraries
to adopt strategies to promote OA and remove some of the obstacles in
this movement such as: establish institutional repositories and
popularize them amongst faculty and researchers; help faculty and
researchers proactively to archive their research papers in
institutional and other repositories; help launching of OA journals in
their respective institution; generate awareness about the OA movement
amongst researchers and scientists as well as funding agencies.
Researchers, as authors of research articles, have very important
role to play in the process of providing OA to their scholarly
publication by submitting a copy of their articles in OAI digital
repositories (self-archiving) and by publishing their articles in OA
journals.
Role of icddr,b in Bangladesh
icddr,b can play a significant role to facilitate worldwide access
to the full text of Bangladeshi Journals. We propose, icddr,b may be the
hub of regional OA centre in near future in considering the following
key points:
* icddr,b is the first introducer of Gold and Green routes in
Bangladesh in 1996 and 2005 respectively;
* First IR in Bangladesh is established at icddr,b in 2005;
* Fast growth of research in Bangladesh;
* It is an International Centre for research activities;
* icddr,b alone publishes a good number of publications from
Bangladesh;
* ICT infrastructure of icddr,b is well established.
In view of the above, we would like to offer the following
recommendations in order to give a good shape of OA movement in
Bangladesh.
Recommendations
In Bangladesh OA is still in infancy, so it is suggested to develop
it and go for "OA".
i) To change the attitudes of authors for publishing research
papers in OA journals;
ii) Universities and research organizations should set-up
institutional repositories and mandate deposition of all scholarly
publications by their researchers and faculties into these repositories;
iii) Library professionals are to be trained in setting up the
institutional repositories;
iv) Library professionals should take initiatives to make parent
organization management understand about OA and IR;
v) Adequate financial support are required from government and
respective institutions;
vi) To develop awareness programme among authors, researchers,
scientists, faculty members, publishers, institutions, library
professionals, university management, general people, readers;
vii) To develop high-tech infrastructure for ICT;
viii) All higher learning institutes and research organizations of
Bangladesh should become a part of the global system of digital
libraries and OA movement;
ix) Appropriate policy is needed to support OA initiatives.
Conclusion
OA facilitates the availability and distribution of scholarly
communication freely, as a means and effort to solve the problem of
inaccessibility, primarily due to financial constraints, especially in
developing countries. In Bangladesh, there has been a gradual
realization of the usefulness of OA among various institutions. A few OA
initiatives have been undertaken and are operational, and some are still
in the developmental stage. The future of OA in Bangladesh is dependent
upon a proper policy and establishment of appropriate framework. In the
implementation of OA, library professionals of Bangladesh should play a
proactive role in the growth of collections in IR. (21)
OA is no longer just an idea to be deconstructed, analyzed, and
reanalyzed. True open access is the long-term answer to access to
scientific literature in low-income and middle-income countries in a way
that the per capita income model open access HINARI can never be. (22)
We now have information about how publishers are practicing it and how
scholars and researchers are reacting to it. The really intriguing
question about the topic today is to deal with the reality of OA and its
exciting promise.
Caption: Chart 1: Ratio of Bangladesh OA journals Compared to
Worldwide DOAJ OA Journals as on September 15, 2013
Acknowledgement
This research study was funded by icddr,b and its donors which
provide unrestricted support to icddr,b for its operations and research.
Current donors providing unrestricted support include: Australian Agency
for International Development (AusAID), Government of the People's
Republic of Bangladesh; Canadian International Development Agency
(CIDA), Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), and
the Department for International Development, UK (DFID). We gratefully
acknowledge these donors for their support and commitment to
icddr,b's research efforts.
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(15.) Chan, Leslie, Barbara Kirsop, and Subbiah Arunachalam. 2011.
"Towards open and equitable access to research and knowledge for
development" PLOS Medicine 8(3): e1001016.
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371
%2Fjournal.pmed.10 01016 (accessed October 17, 2013)
(16.) "Publishers withdraw 2500 journals from free access
scheme in Bangladesh," BMJ 2011 ;342:d196
http://www.bmi.com/content/342/bmi.d196 (accessed October 17, 2013)
(17.) BRAC University Institutional Repository,
http://dspace.bracu.ac.bd/ (accessed October 18, 2013)
(18.) Bangladesh Journals Online (BanglaJOL),
http://www.banglajol.info/index.php/index/about (accessed October 18,
2013)
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http://www.doai.org/doai?func=byCountry&uiLanguage=en (accessed
October 20, 2013)
(20.) "List of private universities,"
http://www.ugc.gov.bd/university/?action=private (accessed October 29,
2013)
(21.) M.H.H. Chowdhury, M.N. Uddin, H. Afroz, and M.A.H. Sameni.
2011. "Building Institutional Repositories in Bangladesh using
Dspace: A New Paradigm of Scholarly Communication," Library
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http://unllib.unl.edu/LPP/chowdhury-uddin-afroz-sameni.htm (accessed
October 30, 2013)
(22.) Tracey Perez Koehlmoos and Richard Smith. 2011. "Big
publishers cut access to journals in poor countries," Lancet 377,
no. 9762 (2011):273-6
Md. Nazim Uddin [1], Tracey Lynn Perez Koehlmoos [2], Shaikh A
Shahed Hossain [1]
(1.) International Centre for Diarrhoel Disease Research,
Bangladesh
(2.) College of Health and Human Services, George Mason University,
USA
Corresponding Author:
Md. Nazim Uddin, PhD, Senior Manager, Library and Information
Services Section (LISS), International Centre for Diarrhoel Disease
Research, Bangladesh. Mohakhali, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh. Email:
nazimuddin@icddrb.org
Table 1: Major OA publishers in the world
Sl. Name of the publisher URL
No.
01. BioMed Central http://www.biomedcentral.com/
info/about/whatis
02. The Public Library http://www.plos.org/about/index.php
of Science (PLoS)
03. Bioline International http://www.bioline.org.br/
info?id=bioline&doc=about
04. MedKnow Publications http://www.medknow.com/aboutus.asp
05. Project Gutenberg http://www.gutenberg.org
06. SPARC http://www.arl.org/sparc/about/
program-plan/index.shtml
07. Directory of OA http://www.doai.org/doai?func=
Journals (DOAJ) loadTempl&templ=longTermArchiving
08. Open J-Gate http://www.openi-gate.com
09. Bangladesh Journals http://www.banglaiol.info/
Online (BanglaJOL)
10. The Directory of OA http://www.opendoar.org/about.html
Repositories
--OpenDOAR
11. Science Direct http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/
(Elsevier Science) browse/all/open-access
12. PMC Journals http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
pmc/iournals/
13. American Chemical http://pubs.acs.org/action/
Society showPublications?display=iournals
14. PhysNet http://de.physnet.net/PhysNet/
iournals.html
15. arXiv.org http://arxiv.org/
16. HighWire http://highwire.stanford.edu/
lists/freeart.dtl
17. Strategian http://www.strategian.com/
free full text articles.html
18. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Main Page
19. CUL Historical http://ebooks.library.cornell.edu/
Math Monographs m/math/index.php
20. Mathematics Book http://www.ams.org/samplings/
Online math-history/math-history
21. Health Education http://wellnessproposals.com/
Library wellness-library/health/
22. IAMCR open access http://iamcr.org/
journals open-access-iournals-newsmenu-322
23. African medical http://indexmedicus.afro.who.int/
journals Journals/Indexi.htm
24. NepJol http://www.nepiol.info/
25. SLJOL http://www.sljol.info+A2:E40/
Table 2: Mobile Phone Subscribers in Bangladesh
The total number of Mobile Phone subscribers has reached 106.934
million at the end of July 2013.
The Mobile Phone subscribers are shown below:
Operators Active Subscribers *
Grameen Phone Ltd. (GP) 44.666
Banglalink Digital Communications Limited 27.324
Robi Axiata Limited (Robi) 23.770
Page 5 of 19
Airtel Bangladesh Limited (Airtel) 7.897
Pacific Bangladesh Telecom Limited (Citycell) 1.361
Teletalk Bangladesh Ltd. (Teletalk) 1.916
Total 106.934
* Subscribers in Millions--The above subscribers' numbers are
declared by the mobile operators
Source: http://www.btrc.gov.bd/index.php?option=com_content&
view=article&id=780:mobilephone-subscribers-in-bangladesh-january-2012
&catid=49:telco-news&Itemid=502
Table 3: PSTN Phone Subscribers in Bangladesh
The total number of PSTN Phone Subscribers has reached 1028.19
thousand at the end of May 2010.
The PSTN Phone subscribers are shown below:
Operators Subscribers *
BTCL 872.41
Telebarta Ltd. 56.42
Jalalabad Telecom Ltd. 10.90
Onetel Communication Ltd. 39.57
Westec Ltd. 17.00
Sheba Phone Ltd. (ISL) 11.62
S. A. Telecom System Ltd. 18.03
Banglaphone Ltd. 2.24
Total 1028.19
* Subscribers in Thousands--The above subscribers'
numbers are declared by the PSTN operators
Source: http://www.btrc.gov.bd/index.php?option=com_content
&view=article&id=410:pstnphone-subscribers-in-bangladesh
&catid=49:telco-news&Itemid=502
Table 4: Internet Subscribers in Bangladesh
The total number of Internet Subscribers has reached 35631.269
thousand at the end of June 2013.
The Internet subscribers are shown below:
Category Subscribers *
Mobile Internet 33904.841
ISP + PSTN 1221.62
WiMAX 504.808
Total 35631.269
* Subscribers in Thousands--The above mentioned figure represents
the number of Active subscribers only. A subscriber/connectionusing
the internet during the last Ninety (90)days is considered to be an
Active subscriber.
Source:
http://www.btrc.gov.bd/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&
id=769:internet-subscribers-in-bangladesh&catid=49:telco-news&
Itemid=502
Table 5: OA status of icddr,b Publications
Publications 2000 2012 Comments
on the
achievement
of OA
No. of Journals 02 01 OA fully
achieved
No. of periodicals 05 07 OA fully
achieved
No. of peer reviewed 92 237 OA partly
articles achieved
No. of working papers 16 13 OA fully
(including special
publications, achieved
scientific
reports, and
annual reports)
No. of communication 03 (Glimpse, Shasthya 08 OA mostly
bulletins/materials Sanglap, and achieved
etc. Electronic Disc Bull)
Others (monographs, books 18 27 OA partly
chapters, etc.) achieved
