Results of the 'Global Research Council' in Berlin announced | Science Codex

"On 29 May 2013, the 2nd Annual Global Meeting of the Global Research Council (GRC) in Berlin has ended. Over three days, the heads of about 70 science and research councils from around the world as well as high-ranking guests from science and research, science administration and research policy attended the meeting. The topics of discussion and endorsement were an Action Plan towards Open Access, a high-level Statement of Principles for Research Integrity as well as new statutes for the GRC. Hosted jointly by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the National Council of Technological and Scientific Development (CNPq) of Brazil, the 2nd Annual Global Meeting was the largest of its kind so far and represented some 80 percent of the world's public, non-ministerial research potential. The outcomes of the meeting's discussions as well as the endorsed documents were presented at a press conference on 29 May 2013 in the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften in Berlin. DFG-President Professor Peter Strohschneider stressed the relevance of "Open Access" to publications as a main paradigm of scientific communication in the following years. The participants agreed that sharing research publications openly is a means to increase the quality of research communication and thus of research itself. The endorsed Action Plan includes activities by which GRC member organisations can foster the open exchange of research results with a high degree of flexibility. Therefore the plan specifies three basic principles: encouragement, awareness rising, and support for researchers that wish to provide their results in Open Access...."