Open Access Publishing in India: An Analysis of Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)

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1 ISSN (P) (e) Open Access Publishing in : An Analysis of Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) Ramesh Pandita To Cite: Pandita, R. (213). Open access publishing in : An analysis of directory of open access journals (DOAJ). International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology, 3(3), Assistant Librarian BGSB University Rajouri- Jammu Corresponding Author Ramesh Pandita rameshpandita9@gmail.com ABSTRACT The concept of open access publishing has flourished all across globe and so has it gained ground in. has been contributing to open access publishing from the very beginning, rather since the realization of need and importance of open access publishing. The present study has been undertaken to assess the scenario of open access publishing in during the past decade. To undertake the present study data has been retrieved from the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), which is more a case of data mining. In the present study attempt has been made to work out on the growth of open access publishing in during the last decade viz. for the period , its contribution to open access publishing at Global, continental level and many other similar things related with the overall scenario of open access publishing in. Attempt has also been made to correlate other studies already undertaken in the field of Open Access (OA) publishing through literature review. The data has been tabulated and analyzed as per the defined objectives of study. Data for analysis was retrieved on December 31, 212 which on date hosted 8518 journals on its website from 121 countries all across the globe. KeyTerms: Open Access, DOAJ,, Asia, Global, Continental. Received On: ; Revised On: ; Accepted On:.9.13 INTRODUCTION Open access (OA) as the term itself suggests is simply something which can be owed as accessible without any hurdle or hiccup. On the similar lines open access publishing is something whereby we make literary output accessible and available to one and all globally without paying anything for it. The concept of open access publishing has received so much of acceptance all across the globe that presently more than 65% counties of the world believe in OA Publishing and as such publish research results in open access format. Realizing the importance of expanding the frontiers of knowledge beyond the borders, most of the leading research institutions all across the globe have started publishing their research results in open access format1. Previously, research results used to get published in closed access format, as such used to have limited viewership with limited visibility and ultimately limited applicability. Open access has not only opened up new vistas of publishing and making the research output easily and freely accessible to common masses but has equally increased the applicability of research output. Realizing the importance and impact of knowledge sharing 6 through all means including open access, more and more research organization, institutions, scholars and people at large have switched over to open access for both publishing and accessing purposes. Weaning library budgets and increasing costs of research journals always acted as an impediment in the dissemination of research output to its optimum. People in countries like used to remain deprived of the most valuable information, mostly concerning areas like health, education, economy, polity and many more and this was just because of the limited or no access to information for the want of limited resources. Fernandez2 opined that developing countries suffer at the hands of closed publishing which bogs down the research output of these countries and do suffers at this front, to which he advocated open access as a solution to remedy this deficit. Genesis of Open Access Publishing can be traced back to the year 199 when the concept was at its infancy stage. In the year 1992 only 5 journals were engaged in open access publishing which has grown considerably over the period of time and for that matter we can see more than 85 open access journals are alone International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3

2 hosted on the DOAJ as on date. research results in better and quicker form with wider viewership. LITERATURE REVIEW NEED, PURPOSE & IMPORATNCE Since the advent of Open Access Publishing a number of studies have been carried out by scholars all across the globe from time to time, covering various aspects of open access publishing. Looking at the advantages of the open access publishing most of the scholars have advocated towards the promotion of this format. Availability of valued research output freely on internet helped the open access publishing to gain momentum. Bluh3, Mark & Shearer4 were of the view that all scientific and scholarly literature should be made available on internet free of cost. Making available research output freely to public helps increase it visibility, impact and ultimately it usage, which should always be a priority consideration while making research results out. Open access publishing has shown tremendous amount of growth and acceptance among learned community during the last decade. Most of the countries all across the world have started publishing their research results in open access format and so has grown the concept of publishing and accessing information in open access format in. The present study has been undertaken with the view to see and assess the growth of open access publishing in during the last decade. Technology enabled society has largely shown interest in switching over to open access publishing from closed format. While carrying out his study on open access publishing Falk5 observed that compared to 5 journals published in to open access format in1992, the number grew over 12 OA journals in the year 22. The other studies carried out in the field of open access publishing include, Lawrence6, Chan7, Deschamps8, Ramachandran9, Harnad1, Hajjem11, Eysenbach12, Norris13. It is always imperative that research output should have greater reach both within and across borders and to increase the effectiveness of research output need is same should get noticed by the maximum number of people from the concerned field. Previously, publishing of research results in lesser known journals used to be equally a problem as the people from related field used to find it difficult to cite those research results. Now since the open access has broken this barrier from all sides as such has maximized the citation of even lesser known journals, even it won't be inappropriate to say that lesser known open access journals have far greater reach and impact than reputed but closely published ones. Some of the good works done in the field of open access publishing in include Arunachalam, Sahu15 wherein the researchers have advocated of need for research institution and other organization to get involved in the OA publishing at larger level. In various national institutes has switched over to open access publishing these include, n Academy of Science, n National Science Academy, Med, Medknow etc. apart from this most of institutions have developed their individual institutional repositories which make the content available to users free of cost. Mukherjee16 in their study on open access reveals that in india about 155 different publishers publish more than 37 journals in open access format. Medknow publications leading the OA publishing tally with 77 journals, followed by AIRCC with 19, NISCAIR 15, Bio-Info 13 and so on. The other studies conducted in the open access arena in n context include Sawant (29) who studies more than 5 OA journals of hosted with DOAJ and O-Jgate. Similarly OA publishing studies were conducted on individual subjects like medicine, LIS, Economics etc by Sahu, Mukherjee18 and Sahu19 respectively. Most of the aforesaid studies and those not covered highlight one common aspect in them that open access publishing has helped increase the visibility of research output. Seekers of information, who were previously deprived of valuable information published in closed formats for not having access to research output for journals being costly or due to some other barriers has been overcome with OA publishing. Even the publishing in the open access format has helped budding scholars to publish their Shrinking library budgets have already led the developing countries to a situation of serial crisis and since being at the developing stage like rest of the developing countries including developed ones have started relying heavily on OA publishing. Closed format publishing especially journals of repute, prices of which used to escalate like anything and under the prevailing budget crisis, OA publishing proved a great boon to both libraries and the seekers of information. The present study will help us to develop a better idea about the need importance and purpose of OA publishing, which in turn is the basis of need, importance and purpose of undertaking the present study. The present study will also help us develop a better understanding about the future of OA publishing in keeping in view the growth and growing trend towards OA publishing when compared with outside world or at global level OBJECTIVES To assess the growing trend towards the open access publishing in. To project 's growth on open access scholarly publications To measure the impact of OA journals published from To assess the contribution of in open access publishing at global and continental level. SCOPE The scope of the present study is limited to journals listed on Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) from 22 to 212 by 121 countries of the world involved with open access publishing. METHODOLOGY Directory of open access journals database has been used to carry out the present study, which on the date of data acquired listed 8518 journals hosted by it on its website form 121 counties of the world. Statistical figures uploaded at the website of said directory accessible at ( has been used for the analysis and evaluation of data. Statistical data acquired was put to excel format for better analysis and understanding mostly in consonance to our desired objectives set for the study. DATA ANALYSIS, DISCUSSION & RESULTS To execute the common operation like, addition, subtraction, drawings, percentage etc the data analysis has been undertaken mostly by putting data in the excel format. Point percentage has been taken up to two decimal points during the entire analysis. International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3 7

3 Cumulative Growth of Journals from at Global and n Table 1: Cumulative Growth of Open Access Journals Journals in DOAJ (Yearwise) Global (%age increase) 34 () 552 ( ) 198 (98.91) 1661 (51.27) 22 (28.98) 2679 (25.7) 3515 (31.2) 4272 (21.53) 5729 (34.1) 7264 (26.79) 8518 (.26) (%age increase) () () 31 (121.42) 45 (45.16) 61 (35.55) 78 (27.86) 1 (28.2) 8 (48) (85.81) 368 (33.81) (25.81) 's %age growth 8 Global %age growth Linear ('s %age growth) Linear (Global %age growth) Fig. 1: Cumulative Growth of Open Access Journals If we have a closer look at the tabulated figures and the graphical presentation of the growth of open access journals both at global level and in we can see the figures as and graphical presentation almost go hand in hand. The trend line drawn at the graphical presentation shows clearly that growth of OA journals in go parallel to that of growth of journals at global level. If we see from the figures on average the annual growth of OA journals at global level remained at % and for same period the growth of OA journals in remained at % almost mirror image of each other. If we have a look at the growth of journals during an individual year we can see OA journals in grew parallel to OA journals at global level during the year 23, 24 with almost equal growth and so stands true during the rest of years with some marginal variation except for the year 21 were shows better growth over global growth rate. Year wise Added Open Access Journals at Global and n Table 2: Year wise Added Journals from Journals in DOAJ (Yearwise) Global (%age increase) 34 () 518 (23.52) 546 (5.4) 563 (3.11) 481 (-.56) 537 (11.64) 836 (55.67) 757 (-9.44) 57 (92.47) 1535 (5.35) 1254 (-18.3) (%age increase) () () (21.42) 16 (-.64) (.28) (6.25) (29.41) (118.18) (164.58) (-26.77) In order to have better understanding of growth of OA Journals both in and at global level it was imperative to reflect the growth of newly introduced OA journals during each year from the year 22 to 212. In this tabulation percentage figures have been drawn in comparison to figures of corresponding year and increase or decrease in figures thereof has been recorded in to 8 95 (2.15) percentage. From the above tabulation we can see that during each year growth of OA journals in moved neck to neck with that of growth in newly introduced OA journals at global level. At global level during the year 26, 29, and 212 the growth remained negative which when compared to the growth was recorded in reverse during the years 25, and 211 International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3

4 and for the rest of the decade showed positive growth in newly introduced OA journals. When we have a look at the overall average growth of newly introduced OA journals at global level we can see the journals grew % which is quite less when compared to growth of newly introduced OA journals in n on annual basis which 1.18% annually. Year wise 's Contribution to Growth of OAJ at Global Table 3: 's Contribution to Growth of Journals Journals in DOAJ (Yearwise) Global 's Contribution (%age) () (2.7) (3.11) (2.48) 16 (3.32) (3.16) 22 (2.63) 48 (6.34) 127 (8.71) 93 (6.5) 95 (7.57) Fig. 2: Year wise 's Contribution to Growth of Journals In the above tabulation attempt was made to assess the 's contribution of newly introduced open access journals at global level. From the tabulated figures and the graphical representation made, we can see there has been almost steady growth of newly introduced OA journals on annual basis both in and at global level as well. In the table-i and II above we have seen the growth of remained parallel to that of growth at global level. Still more if we see on annual basis contributed 8.71% journals during the year 21, followed by 7.57% in 212 and 6.36% in 29. The figures of contribution percentage are quite encouraging especially when taken from the view that the contribution of has maximized towards the fourth quarter of the decade. Even during the year 211 contributed 6.5% journals, which is in tandem with figures reflected during other years. During the rest of the years of the decade the growth remained on average at 3% still more the encouraging part of it is that growth showed slight but steady increase year after year. Cumulative Contribution of to OAJ Publishing at Global level Table 4: Cumulative Contribution to OAJ at Global Journals in DOAJ (Yearwise) Global 's Contribution (%age) () (2.53) 31 (2.82) 45 (2.7) (2.84) ( 2.91) 1 (2.84) 8 (3.46) (4.8) 368 (5.6) (5.43) Above tabulation was drawn with the view to have better understanding about the overall 's contribution to OA publishing at global level. In this table and through graphical representation we have tried to highlight the contribution of on year to year basis. On the date of retrieving data from the DOAJ directory, the directory overall had 8518 journals listed on its website from 121 countries all across the world and contribution as on day remained at 5.43% which is fourth largest contributor to OA publishing in world with journals after United Kingdom with 575 journals and the largest contributor International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3 9

5 Fig. 3: Cumulative Contribution to OAJ at Global from Asia. From the annual analysis it is also apparent that 's contribution to OA publishing during the whole decade remained steady and do showed steady increase in its contribution at global level and hopefully this trend will keep continue in the years to come. Cumulative Growth of Open Access Journals in Asia and Table 5: Cumulative Growth of OAJ in Asia and Year wise Cumulative Growth Continent / Country Asia (%age) () ( 24.13) 31 ( 22.3) 45 (19.82) 61 (22.18) 78 (23.21) 1 (23.) 8 (25.96) (31.7) 368 (3.61) (31.34) Asian Scenario n Scenario n Percentage Contribution Fig. 4: Cumulative Growth of OAJ in Asia and At the continental level we can see Asia is the third largest continent which contributes to OA publishing with 77 journals after North America which publishes 49 journals in open access format and hosted on DOAJ directory. Above tabulation and graphical representation has been made to give a clear 18 understanding about the contribution of in OA publishing at continental level viz. Asia. with its journals contributes 31.34% of OA journals at continental level. After 27 remained the top contributor to open access publishing from Asia which otherwise was dominated by Japan till 26. From the International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3

6 percentage point of view almost showed steady growth during the whole decade which ran above 2% during the first three quarters of the decade and more than 3% during the last quarter. Year wise Added Open Access Journals from in Asia and Table 6: Year wise Added OAJ from in Asia and Year wise Contribution of OAJ Asia () (25) (2.98) (15.9) 22 (22.91) 48 (34.78) 16 (33.33) (27.86) (4.31) (29.33) 95 (34.54) Fig. 5: Year wise Added OAJ from at Asia and Above tabulation was drawn with the view to assess the growth of newly introduced OA journals on yearly basis in Asia, accordingly comparison was drawn with number of OA journals introduced in. From tabulated figures we can see that had been the major contributor of OA journals at Asian level, though Japan dominated during the first quarter of the decade and thereafter there has been steady decline in the introduction of journals and the momentum was taken over by which for the rest of decade dominated in introducing maximum number of OA journals. During the year 25 contributed more than 15% journals and for the years 23, 24, 27, 28 and 211 growth remained between 2 to 3 percent. Growth of newly introduced OA journals recorded for remained more than 3% for rest of the period, except during 21, when it crossed 4% mark. Asia's Top Ten Open Access Journals Publishing Countries Table 7: Asia's Top Ten Open Access Contributor's Country Journals %age Contribution (Global) %age Contribution (Continental) Turkey Iran Japan Pakistan Malaysia Russia Indonesia Korea, South China Rest of Asia Total International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3 181

7 Turkey Iran Japan Pakistan Malaysia Russia Indonesia Korea, South China Rest of Asia publishing module all across the globe has opened up new vistas for publishing research results and has also helped to increase the visibility of research output and ultimately its application by the end users. In the coming days the trend may grow to a larger proportion and we may reach to a stage whereby all closed format publishing may turn open, as OA format has already posed challenge to the survival and sustenance of closed format publishing. REFERENCES 1. Das, A.K., Sen, B.K. & Dutta, C. (27). ETD policies, strategies and initiatives in :a critical appraisal. Paper presented at the 1th International Symposium on Electronic Theses and Dissertations, Uppsala, Sweden. (Accessed on ), 1/Das_Dutta_Sen ETD_27_Paper.pdf 2. Fernandez, L. (26). Open access initiatives in -an evaluation. Partnership: The Canadian Journal of Library and Information Practice and Research, 1(1), (Accessed on ), perj/article/view/11/2, WebCite at webcitation.org/ 5j21aDoUf) 3. Bluh, P. (26). Open access, legal publishing, and online repositories. Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 34(1), (Accessed on ), umaryland.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi? Fig. 6: Asia's Top Ten Open Access Contributors From the pie diagram drawn and the tabulation, we get the clear grasping about the top contributors of OA journals from continent Asia. From the said analysis we can see that leads the table with its contribution of OA journals which constitutes 5.43% share at global level and 31.34% share at continental level. is followed by Turkey with 21 journals, thereby making it 2.46% global share and.21% continental share. Iran with 166 OA journals stands at number three slot having global share of 1.94% and continental share of 11.23%. Accordingly the hierarchal structure which emerges for top ten contributors of OA journals in Asia is followed by Japan, Pakistan, Malaysia, Russia, Indonesia, Korea South, and China. Rest of the Asia contributes 18 OA Journals constituting 2.11% share at global level and 12.18% at continental level. CONCLUSION 's contribution to OA publishing has grown leaps and bounds during the last decade, and if the trend continues in the same fashion towards the next decade there is every likeliness that in near future may become top contributor of OA publishing at global level. Also like rest of the world there is growing consciousness among n intellect class towards the importance of open access publishing. From the above analysis, we can say the concept of open access publishing has grown to a large extent in. as a country is largest contributor of open access publishing in Asia and 4th largest in the world. At the global level concept of open access publishing has received equally greater importance and one can see that OA Journals have almost grown at constant level during the last decade. Except for the year 25 and 211 has almost shown steady growth in the newly introduced OA Journals. In terms of average percentage growth of OA Journals supersedes in global average percentage growth of OA journals. Realizing the need and importance of open access publishing most of research organization, academic intuitions or even Govt. institutions in have started publishing their research results in open access format. Of the late, a good number of closed format journals have switched over to OA publishing module and make scholarly content available to public free of cost in open access format. Some of the previously closed access journals have also initiated process towards making available the back issues of the journal to public by adapting to digitization techniques and creating its archives. Acceptance of OA 182 Article = 8&context=fac_pubs, Archived by WebCite at 4. Mark, T. & Shearer, K. (26). Institutional repositories: A review of content recruitment strategies. Paper presented at the World Library and Information Congress: 72nd IFLA General Conference and Council, Seoul, Korea. (Accessed on ), Archived by WebCite at 5. Howard, F. (23). Journal publishing is ripe for change. Electronic Library, 21(2), , (Accessed on ), Lawrence, S. (21). Online or invisible? Nature, 411(6837), 521. (Accessed on , online-nature1/archived by WebCite at h t t p : / / w w w. webcitation.org/5j7fvichu 7. Chan, L. & Kirsop, B. (21). Open archiving opportunities for developing countries: Towards equitable distribution of global knowledge. Ariadne, 2, (Accessed on ), Deschamps, Ch. (23). Round table:open access issues for developing countries. Information Services & Use, 23 (2/3), Ramachandran, P.V. & Scaria, V. (24). Open access publishing in the developing world: Making a difference. Journal of Orthopedics, 1(1). (Accessed on ), International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3

8 1. Harnad, S. & Brody, T. (24) Comparing the impact of open access (OA) vs Non-OA articles in the same journals. D-Lib Magazine, 1(6), (Accessed on ), dlib.org/dlib/june 11 Hajjem, C., Gingras, Y., Brody, T., Carr, L. & Harnad, S. (25). Open access to research increases citation impact. Montréal. Canada: Université du Québec à Montréal, Institut des sciences cognitives. (Accessed on ), Archived by WebCite at 12 Eysenbach, G. (26). Citation advantage of open access articles. PLOS Biology, 4(5), (Accessed on ), /journal.pbio.4157, Archived by WebCite at 13 Norris, M., Oppenheim, C. & Rowland, F. (28). The citation advantage of open-access articles. Journal of the American Society of Information Science and Technology, 59(12), Arunachalam, S. (28). Open access in : Hopes and frustrations. Proceedings ELPUB 28 Conference on Electronic Publishing: Toronto, Canada, Sahu, D.K. & Parmar, R. (26). The position around the world: Open access in. In N. Jacobs (Ed.), Open Access: Key Strategic, Technical, and Economic Aspects. Oxford: Chandos Publishing, Mukherjee, B. & Mal, B.K. 2 's Efforts in Open Access Publishing. Sahu, D.K. (23). Open access in medical sciences: An n perspective. 67th Annual Meeting of the n National Science Academy: Seminar on Open Access to Scientific Data and Information, Pune,, (Accessed on ). 18 Mukherjee, B. (28). Open access scholarly publishing in library and information science. Annals of Library & Information Studies, 55(3), Sahu, D.K. (29). Economics and citation impact of open access journal publishing in : An experience of eight years and eighty journals. Open Access to Science Publications: Policy perspective, Opportunities and Challenges, (Accessed on ). International Journal of Information Dissemination and Technology July-September 213 Vol. 3 Issue 3 183