Open Access

Open Access availability of Indian Research Output

The Indian research output during 2010 to 2019 has been analysed to identify what proportion of research output is available in Open Access. It is observed that Open Access availability of Indian Research Output has improved from 25.86 % in 2010 to 35.13 % in 2019. In overall terms, 33.61% of the Indian Research output during 2010-2019 period is found to be available in Open Access. The figure below (on the left) shows year-wise percentage of Open Access availability of the overall Indian Research Output during 2010 to 2019 period. Among the Open Access papers, Gold Open Access is the most prevelant type (increasing from 43.01% in 2010 to 63.44% in 2019). This is followed by Green Open Access (19.67%), Bronze(16.1%) and Hybrid (7.12%). The figure below (on the right) shows year-wise Open Access sub-types of during the period 2010 to 2019.

Categories

  • Open Access availability
  • Comparison with major countries
  • Subject-area Distribution
  • OA availability of funded research

    • Tag Cloud

    India Research Output Dimensions World Data Ranks Subjects
    Figure 7.1
    Figure 7.2


    Comparison with other major countries

    The Open Access levels of India are compared with 20 other major countries. It is observed that India is on the Lower side of Open Access availability level, with only 33.61% papers available in Open Access. In comparison, Brazil has 62.91% of the research papers in Open Access, Switzerland has 55.79% papers in Open Access, United Kingdom 55.59% papers in Open Access, Netherlands (54.08%), Sweden (53.32%), Poland (51.68&). Only China (26.44%), Iran (28.3%) and Taiwan (31.03%) have OA proportion lesser than India. The table below shows OA percentage for 20 major countries.

    Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
    Australia 30.11 33.79 37.54 39.94 41.55 44.03 46.99 48.56 48.92 48.97
    Brazil 60.55 61.01 62.43 61.46 60.08 61.44 64.54 64.88 65.22 63.93
    Canada 31.66 33.84 36.22 38.32 39.64 42.15 44.06 46.07 47.67 47.77
    China 12.23 14.41 19.07 19.79 22.26 27.64 30.28 32.5 32.9 34.45
    France 31.16 36.84 38.12 39.09 40.83 44.15 46.96 49.96 53.27 58.69
    Germany 28.52 34.54 37.03 37.59 40.13 42.62 45.29 46.27 48.71 50.79
    India 25.86 28.63 33.27 33.55 34.25 34.4 35.71 34.56 34.03 35.13
    Iran 17.37 21.52 25.67 25.02 27.61 28.93 30.69 30.47 31.2 32.49
    Italy 29.06 33.16 35.89 37.95 40.48 43.28 45.72 49.06 50.78 52.9
    Japan 23.1 27.1 29.25 31.57 34.38 38.79 40.83 36.56 39.12 40.85
    Netherlands 40.69 43.56 44.52 43.65 45.31 51.99 57.96 63.96 68.22 69.36
    Poland 29.24 37.63 42.49 43.78 51.16 52.34 54.39 57.45 59.99 62.97
    Russia 13.27 18.18 22.09 24.21 25.67 30.86 34.36 37.17 42.16 50.57
    South Korea 23.78 26.5 29.97 31.65 34.13 36.91 39.34 42.14 44.5 46.83
    Spain 32.48 36.27 39.92 40.8 45.07 48.27 51.15 54.52 57.06 58.98
    Sweden 36.81 41.92 45.04 47.19 50.32 52.64 55.41 59.51 64.71 66.33
    Switzerland 42.61 46.99 50.46 51.87 53.74 55.85 59.44 60.11 62.96 64.32
    Taiwan 18.14 20.33 25.85 26.91 29.78 34.13 35.32 38.45 40.18 41.95
    UK 33.76 37.58 41.24 45.57 51.34 57.2 65.79 69.11 71.06 69.15
    USA 35.57 38.75 41.05 42.26 43.81 47.25 49.62 49.84 51.66 51.64

    Subject area-wise Open Access availability of Indian Research Output

    While India has overall 33.61% papers available in Open Access for the 2010- 2019 period, Open Access availability varies across different subject areas. These variations are as large as 48%. Subjects like Studies in Creative Arts and Writing (10.93%), Information and Computing Science (14.17%) and Technology (15.21%) have a very low proportion of papers available in OA; subjects like Medical & Health Sciences (58.66%), Biological Sciences (41.54%) and Physical Sciences (38.74%) have relatively higher proportion of papers available in Open Access.
    subject-wise fig

    Open Access availability of Funded Research Output

    As it is often a condition and/or expectation of the funding agencies that research outputs out of publicly funded research projects should be openly accessible, therefore the research outputs out of the funded projects is analysed to find out what proportion of the research output is available in Open Access. it is observed that only about 29.06% of the funded research output in India is available in OA, though the availability has increased slightly from 25.22% in 2010 in 30.04% in 2019. The figure below (on the left) shows the year-wise Open Access availability of the funded research output. Out of the total funded research output during 2010-2019, 71% is Closed Access, 12% Gold Open Access, 9% Green Open Access, 5% Bronze Open Access and 3% Hybrid Open Access. The pie-chart below (on the right) shows the distribution.

    Figure 7.4
    Figure 7.5

    Note: The above analysis/outputs are generated by the use of data obtained from Dimensions and Altmetric (a part of Digital Science).