Scholarly communication: the challenge and impact of open access (OA) and institutional repositories (IRs), a South African perspective

The presentation reviews the impact of open access (OA) and how research institutes and universities have in many ways been agents of significant knowledge production in South Africa. As one of the institutional repository (IR) managers in South Africa, the researcher views the axis of information, communication and technology (ICTs), OA and IRs as enablers for local scholarly communication and knowledge production that should all be embraced by universities and research institutions in South Africa, and the rest of the African continent. The learning, research and teaching environment at South Africa universities and research institutions due to the availability of the Internet has changed for the better. Therefore harnessing research information related to aspects of cultural, political, socio-economic and scientific knowledge should be a priority for academia and libraries ... This research looks at the various stages of development of open access implementation at the University of Johannesburg (UJ), University of South Africa (UNISA), University of Pretoria (UP), University of Stellenbosch (SUN) and Centre for Science and Industrial Research Council (CSIR), early adopters of D-Space. IR Managers from this consortium formed a community of practice (CoP) from which this study was investigated. The case study reviews the milestones achieved with regards to institutional IR policies and OA readiness in South Africa in general. Though a number of questions and challenges still remain, the research attempted to uncover most practical problems impeding IR functions and services at these institutions mentioned and also provide solutions to disseminating research outputs from South African scholars. Some include the IR framework policy, procedures and copyright vs. self-archiving or institutional archiving at this stage of development of OA repositories in South Africa ..."