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Academics’ use and attitude towards open access in selected higher learning institutions of Ethiopia

Information Development 2015, Vol. 31(1) 13–26 ª The Author(s) 2013 Reprints and permission: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/0266666913500977 idv.sagepub.com

Yared Mammo Haramaya University, Ethiopia

Patrick Ngulube University of South Africa

Abstract Libraries in higher learning institutions (HLIs) of Ethiopia have been providing electronic information (e-information) resources to users such as academics through different access models, including open access. Nonetheless, little is known about the academics’ attitudes toward open access journals. The study triangulated qualitative and quantitative data collection methods. Data were obtained through questionnaires and semistructured interviews. Out of 768 academics from seven selected universities in Ethiopia who were surveyed, 566 (78 percent) responded. The data were analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively by means of content analysis and basic descriptive statistics respectively. The results of the study revealed that 78 percent of the academics were aware of open access journals. On the whole, they have a perceived positive attitude towards open access journals and would like to use them in the future. Moreover, they have been using open access journals as an alternative access model to the conventional journals subscription model; and yet to optimize the benefits of open access among academics, they expect university librarians to promote and enhance the accessibility of open access journals in their respective university libraries and in Ethiopia in general. Further studies using a similarly rigorous approach are required to determine the generality of this finding. Keywords e-information resources, access models, open access, e-journals, institutional repositories, serials crisis, university libraries, Ethiopia

Ethiopian academics are already aware of some of the benefits of open access. Introduction and context of the study Research outputs need to be more accessible to provide solutions to local and global problems. However, there are millions of instructors and researchers in Africa (particularly in sub-Saharan Africa) without access to research information (Cetto, 2001; Kuchma, 2010; Nwagwu and Ahmed, 2009; UNESCO 2010). This has been the case in Ethiopia as well. However, currently Ethiopian university libraries are considering open access models as one of their options to increase accessibility of e-journals (e-information resources) and to better serve users, even though academics’ attitudes towards open access journals have not yet been adequately studied.

In particular, the present scenario of increased research outputs and an increasing number of journals (Prosser, 2004: 23), together with shrinking budgets of libraries and increasing costs of journals, is forcing libraries to harness various access options/ models to satisfy the information needs of scholars through resource sharing, consortia purchasing and open access (Chauhan and Kaur, 2009: 100). This means that as

Corresponding author: Patrick Ngulube, School of Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Studies, University of South Africa, PO Box 392, UNISA, 0003, South Africa. Email: [email protected]

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academic libraries became unable to afford all the journals that instructors and researchers at their institutions required (Prosser, 2004: 23), partnerships and open access models became priority items on their agendas. There is a growing realization that open access publication can offer immense benefits to authors and readers, as well as furthering research in general (Prosser, 2003: 166). OA also reduces unintentional duplication of research efforts (Waaijers, 2009). Furthermore, researchers and information users in the southern hemisphere often complain of feeling isolated from global information exchange and the wider scientific community. Hence, OA also provides the potential to foster partnerships and strengthen scientific cooperation among southern hemisphere countries, as well as between southern and northern hemisphere countries (Durrant, 2004). Globally, OA may transform the world information landscape (Repanovici, 2010). After all, open access promotes equity. Particularly in the developing world, it will increase scientists and academics’ capacity to both access and contribute to world science (Salvador Declaration on Open Access, 2005). The purpose of this study was to investigate the academics’ use of and attitude towards OA in selected higher learning institutions (HLIs). Situated in the horn of Africa, Ethiopia with a population size of nearly 82.4 million is the second most populous country in Africa, next to Nigeria (National Population and Housing Census of Ethiopia, 2011). Agriculture is the main sector which accounts for about 40 percent of the national GDP, 90 percent of exports, and 85 percent of employment (Estifanos, 2010). The industry and service sectors contribute 13 percent and 36 percent of GDP, respectively (United Nations Development Programme, 2011). Ethiopia’s infrastructure of information and communication technologies is one of the lowest in sub-Saharan Africa (Robert, 2011). The Ethiopian Government has embarked upon an ambitious effort to expand higher learning institutions throughout the country. At present there are 32 universities in Ethiopia (Global Open Access Portal, 2011), of which seven were selected for this study.

Statement of the problem The benefit of open access to researchers in HLIs is enormous. Therefore, the debate on the value of open access for publicly funded research information is now migrating from ‘‘whether’’ to ‘‘how’’ (Chan,

Kirsop, Costa and Arunachalam, 2005: 7). The issue is twofold: first, it is about how to get access to e-journals from the North; and second, it is about how to get local and regional research outputs to international users. There is a need to embrace OA because it is an important means of communicating science, and has the possibility of bridging and balancing the flow of scientific information from North to South. OA may foster information and knowledge sharing within research, educational, and scientific communities in economically disadvantaged regions (Canada, 2009) and reduce the cost of accessing information (Houghton, 2009) as it addresses the serials and permission crises. Little is known about the extent to which researchers in HLIs of Africa utilize OA resources (Chanakira, 2012; Muredzi, 2012). With the foregoing in mind, the research was guided by the following questions:     

What is the current status of open access in HLIs of Ethiopia? Do academics have knowledge of the existence of OA journals? How did academics become aware of OA journals? For what reasons do academics use OA journals? What is the perception of academics about OA journals in relation to – – – –



their standards of quality peer reviewed copyright their impact factor

To what extent can OA be regarded as a possibility for increasing accessibility to e-information resources?

Literature review Different authors have provided various definitions of open access (OA), as have a number of declarations and statements made about OA. For instance, Wyatt (2010: 305) defined OA as ‘‘a comprehensive source of human knowledge and cultural heritage that has been approved by the scientific community’’ and Yiotis (2005) described OA as an acceptable worldwide means for an equitable dissemination of information resources by removing scholarly access restrictions in the form of copyright protection or fee-based dissemination policies.

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The major declarations and/or statements about OA have included the Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002), the Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing (2003) and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access (2003), which have developed the core concepts over time. Referring to these collectively as the ‘‘BBB’’ definition, Peter Suber, as cited in Houghton, Rasmussen, Sheehan, Oppenheim, Morris, Creaser, Greenwood, Summers and Gourlay (2009), suggested that open access removes price barriers (subscription fees) and permission barriers (copyright and licensing restrictions) to royalty-free literature (i.e. scholarly works created for free by authors), making them available with minimal use restrictions (e.g. author attribution). The term ‘‘open access’’ is now widely used in at least two senses. For Bailey (2006), OA literature is digital, online and free of charge; it removes price barriers but not permission barriers. For other authors, OA literature is digital, online, free of charge and free of unnecessary copyright and licensing restrictions (Canessa and Zennaro, 2008); it removes both price barriers and permission barriers. It also allows reuse rights that exceed fair use. Scientists subsequently agreed to use the term ‘‘weak OA’’ for the removal of price barriers alone, and ‘‘strong OA’’ for the removal of both price and permission barriers. Over the course of the past decade, OA has moved from the preserve of a few visionaries to the mainstream of scholarly communications. The growth of OA has been dramatic by any standard (Prosser, 2010). The ongoing increases in journal prices (the serials crisis), in particular, make OA an attractive alternative to a commercial publishing model (Alzahrani, 2010: 4). A number of studies (Kirsop 2002; Onsrud, 2004: 114) have noted that OA models are sometimes viewed as alternative economic models, which are initiated in response to price signals and serial crises, specifically the ever-rising costs of serials. Therefore, nowadays developing countries have started to regard OA as one of the options to increase accessibility of e-journals (e-information resources) among instructors and researchers in higher learning institutions. Open access assumes that knowledge is universal and that anyone can use it once they have access to it (Wyatt, 2010: 306). In pursuit of that ideal, OA advocates that at least research funded by public funds should be made available to users free of charge, and it encourages those higher learning institutions and researchers that have not yet made their research output freely available online, to do so. In that regard,

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one of the achievements of the worldwide OA movement has been to persuade 80 percent of non-openaccess journals to let their authors deposit the peer-reviewed versions of their work in OA repositories (Canessa and Zennaro, 2008). The reviewed literature shows that there are many different benefits of OA for developing countries. OA serves to overcome price crises (the serials crisis) and permission crises that are hindering researchers and HLIs in developing countries such as Ethiopia from accessing e-journals, in particular, and e-information resources in general. The easier the access to research results, the more readily they may be read and understood, used, applied and built upon (Harnad, 2005). Accordingly, UNESCO (2011) commented that OA increases productivity and new insights. In other words, OA facilitates accelerated scientific communication and fosters new scientific discoveries (Herb, 2010). There are also many other benefits and opportunities that OA can provide to HLIs in developing countries such as Ethiopia. Among these is the solution it may provide to the problems created by the traditional journals subscription model of access to e-information resources. OA can also be considered a knowledge distribution model by means of which scholarly, peerreviewed journals are made freely available to anyone, anywhere over the Internet (Rossini, 2007). Put differently, OA may overcome the serials crisis and increase access to e-information resources in developing countries such as Ethiopia. The reviewed literature showed that the traditional scholarly communication model, that is, the journals subscription model, has proved to be problematic for HLIs in developing countries such as Ethiopia. It is becoming increasingly expensive to subscribe to mainstream scientific journals. As a result, accessibility of e-information resources (particularly e-journals) is becoming increasingly difficult for HLIs in developing countries as result of the ever-rising journal prices. In other words, the occurrence of the serials crisis is persuading academic libraries in developing countries to move away from the traditional journals subscriptions model to the OA model. In addition to overcoming the serials crisis, the other argument for stronger support of the OA model is easier access to scientific knowledge. For instance, 90 percent of the participants in a study conducted by Mann, Walter, Hess and Wigand (2009: 136) revealed that open access publishing was going to serve this purpose. They also argued that

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various attempts (open access initiatives) have been and still are being made to reduce the information gap between rich and poor countries. The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) (2003) also acknowledged that the transition from current subscription-based journals to the open access model would actually save money in advanced countries and would allow the whole world to access scientific knowledge for free. Houghton (2009) estimated that if every scientific and scholarly article were made publicly available (if the OA model were applied), it would save the Netherlands EUR 133 million a year. Similarly, higher learning institutions found in developing countries such as Ethiopia would be able to stretch their limited funds further if they could seize the advantages of OA effectively and efficiently. So, it will not be surprising that libraries are involved in a wide range of OA-related activities, as there is a strong connection between open access and the mission of libraries (Swan and Chan, 2009). During the last decade, OA has become an important means of communication in science. Scientific communication is, after all, the essence of scientific process – without communicating research results, science itself would never prosper (Grgic, 2011: 5). This is indeed one of the opportunities that OA holds for HLIs in developing countries such as Ethiopia, because OA can advance science and scientific communication among researchers at national, regional and international levels. In so doing, OA may foster partnerships and strengthen scientific cooperation and collaborative approaches (Rossini, 2007), both among developed nations and between developed and developing countries such as Ethiopia. There is no question that open access truly expands shared knowledge across scientific fields. It is the best path for accelerating multidisciplinary breakthroughs in research (Mo¨ller, 2006: 68). Above all, Scaria (2004) envisaged OA as the future of scientific communication for developing countries such as Ethiopia. In terms of this vision, it is believed that, ultimately, developing countries such as Ethiopia will be able to overcome those factors that negatively influence accessibility of e-information resources (e-journals) and reap the untold benefits of OA. They would thus be able to transform themselves in many ways, such as by improving the quality of education, enhancing productivity of researchers and enabling institutions to be better placed to meet the expectations of the society and the nation. On the whole, OA not only provides access to knowledge but also could help to

support development in developing countries (Canada, 2009). The reviewed literature indicated that OA is growing in developing countries such as Ethiopia and it is being considered as an appropriate model for knowledge distribution (Rossini, 2007: 4). Herb (2010) identified the following benefits of OA and the opportunities that it holds for HLIs of developing countries such as Ethiopia: a. science-related arguments (open access accelerates scientific communication) b. financial arguments (open access relieves the serials crisis) c. social arguments (open access reduces the digital divide) d. democracy-related arguments (open access facilitates participation) e. sociopolitical arguments (open access levels disparities). Thus, OA may be an answer to access to e-information resources in HLIs of Ethiopia. The reviewed literature showed that OA might increase accessibility of e-information resources (e-journals) by overcoming the serials crisis and the permission crisis. It can also empower academic communication among instructors and researchers. In short, it is being considered as the future of scientific communication in developing countries (Scaria, 2004) such as Ethiopia.

The research story The study triangulated qualitative and quantitative research methods. The targeted population was 7684 university instructors and researchers, from the ranks of graduate assistant to professor, based at the main campuses of the seven selected universities. The source for the study population was the Education Statistics Annual Abstract 2010/2011, which was published by the Ethiopian Ministry of Education. Only those universities that offered postgraduate programmes were selected. Academics were selected through stratified random sampling so as to represent colleges and/or institutes in the seven target universities. When determining the size of a sample, it is sometimes presumed that a sample should be based on some percentage of the population from which it is drawn (Ngulube 2005: 134). Grinnell and Williams (1990) (cited in Ngulube, 2005: 134) stated that a 10 percent sample should be fine in most cases,

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Figure 1. Awareness of OA before the survey.

especially where the population is less variable (more homogeneous). Data were obtained through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Questionnaires were administered to instructors and researchers and semistructured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of experienced academics from the selected universities. Out of a sample of 768 academics from seven selected universities in Ethiopia who were surveyed, 730 responded, representing a response rate of 95 percent. However, the response rate was technically reduced to 566 (78 percent) because 164 (22 percent) academics were unaware of the existence of OA journals, as shown in Figure 1. They were thus deemed to be incompetent to give informed and valid answers to the rest of the survey questions. The data were analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively. Basic descriptive statistics, such as frequencies and percentages, and graphical presentation were used to analyse and present quantitative data from the questionnaires. Qualitative data analysis – which involved preparing and organizing the data for analysis, then reducing the data into themes through a process of coding and condensing the codes, interpreting, narrating and, finally, representing the data in different themes or categories – was employed for the interview data.

Results and discussions This section presents the results of the research and discussions of the results. Each section is based on the relevant research question that guided the research.

Status of open access in HLIs of Ethiopia In spite of a wide variety of research endeavours and the production of information and knowledge in the country, the Ethiopian academic community has been predominantly on the receiving end of research-based information for quite some time. This was due to lack of proper infrastructure and means of communicating research results that were generated locally. Consequently, OA is a relatively recent movement in Ethiopia. However, the proliferation of professional journals and ICT infrastructure in the country has given a kick start to the research and academic communities’ ability to access information and knowledge freely or at a lower cost (Global Open Access Portal, 2011). Currently there are three OA repositories, at Addis Ababa University, the International Livestock Research Institute and the Economic Commission for Africa. There are eight OA journals published in the country: The Ethiopian Journal of Health Development, Bulletin of the Chemical Society of Ethiopia, The Ethiopian Journal of Education and Sciences, The Ethiopian Journal of Environmental Studies and Management, Momona Ethiopian Journal of Science, Journal of Business and Administrative Studies, Mizan Law Review and The Ethiopian Veterinary Journal. Researchers from Ethiopia also published articles in international OA journals, for example, 189 articles were published with BioMed Central – an STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publisher which has pioneered the OA publishing model (Global Open Access Portal, 2011). For the higher learning institutions of Ethiopia, access to e-information resources is facilitated by the

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International Network for the Advancement of Scientific Publications (INASP), via its Programme for Enhancement of Research Information (PERI); United Nations (UN) access programmes, through the Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA); Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI); and Online Access to Research in the Environment (OARE), which are collectively known as Research4Life. Partners such as publishers and aggregators, as well as other OA models, also facilitate access to e-information resources. However, low Internet bandwidth, a lack of clear institutional and national policy on OA and funding were identified by the informants as potential problems to the OA initiative in Ethiopia. The findings are partially confirmed by Ubogu (2009), who opined that the factors that adversely affect the development of OA in Africa are a lack of a champion (preferably in the library), university policy environments, institutional capacities, technical capacities and funding. Academic libraries in higher learning institutions of Ethiopia are currently providing e-information resources (e-journals) to users through traditional scholarly communication, known as the subscription-based (toll-access) model (Mammo, 2013). The price crisis (serials crisis) dictates that higher learning institutions in Ethiopia have to consider alternative access models that may ameliorate the situation. In this regard, it is believed that OA is an ideal alternative for Ethiopian university libraries, thus enabling them to serve users (instructors and researchers) better in the 21st century knowledge era.

Academics’ awareness of OA before the survey Respondents were asked to indicate whether they were aware of the existence of OA journals before the survey. For this question, respondents were required to answer in the negative or affirmative. The results revealed that the majority of respondents, namely 538 (78 percent), were aware of the existence of OA before the survey. Only 164 (22 percent) were unaware of the existence of OA journals. The latter group comprised 26 academics from Addis Ababa University (AAU); 12 from Bahir Dar University (BU); 28 from Gondar University (GU); 24 from Haramaya University (HU); 16 from Hawassa University (HAU); 30 from Jimma University (JU); and another 28 from Mekelle University (MU). This implies that the majority of academics were aware of the existence

of OA journals, although this varied from institution to institution, as illustrated in Figure 1. The following verbatim statements from openended questions on enhancing awareness and accessibility of OA by librarians and university libraries are instructive: I know that there are trials by our university ICT unit to increase the staff awareness on these issues, but I believe there is a need to do more and address larger portion of population [instructors and researchers]. The Librarians should always update e-information resources as per the state-of-the art. In addition to establishment of e-resources it is important to create awareness among users. The university library should take the initiative in informing the availability of e-information resources in different campuses of the university. Training needed both to instructions and students – to have greater impact on academic environment. I strongly recommend giving awareness to whole staff of HLIs of Ethiopia. Promotion and awareness creation exercises are needed to promote and use of the library resources in general and e-resources in particular. Universities in Ethiopia must be encouraged to know the availability and accessibility of e-information and encourage others to access and use it. E-information resources especially those using open access possibility should be advertised to the university community of two times a year. New concepts, so awareness creation is needed.

The majority of the respondents seem to put emphasis on the need to raise awareness of OA resources.

Source of awareness of OA journals A multiple-response question was asked to find out how the academics became aware of OA journals. Figure 2 illustrates the findings. Living and working in an information- and knowledge-rich environment means that information encountering (i.e. unexpected discovery of useful or interesting OA journals or other e-information resources) is almost inevitable, as the

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Figure 2. Source of awareness of open access journals (N ¼ 566).

Figure 3. Reasons for using open access journals.

Internet is frequently searched for pertinent information. So the difference between those who were aware of OA journals and those who were not is determined by the information-seeking behaviour of users: some users might consider OA journals, while others simply ignore the information encountered while searching for other information.

Reasons for using OA journals Academics were also asked to indicate the reasons for using OA journals. Respondents were supposed to select their reasons from five options, including ‘‘Other’’. Multiple responses were possible. Figure 3 illustrates that 470 (83 percent) respondents reported that they used OA journals to access scholarly literature (e-journals and other e-information resources). On the other hand, 167 (31 percent) respondents

reported that they used OA journals both to access e-information and to disseminate their findings. About 5 (1 percent) used such journals only to publish their work. However, 96 (17 percent) of the respondents said that they did not use them at all. The results showed that, beyond accessing OA journals for free, academics also published their work on platforms that provided immediate access to their work on the publisher’s website at no extra costs to the publisher. In OA, the cost of publishing is transferred from the publishers to the authors, who have to pay processing fees. Some institutions cover these fees. It might be interesting to determine which institutions cover the publishing costs in Ethiopia, and how this influences the use of OA journals by academics as an avenue of scholarly communication. However, there are some OA publishers who waive the article processing fees in the case researchers from

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Figure 4. Standard of quality of open access journals (N ¼ 566).

developing countries such as Ethiopia, although there are some formalities that universities must comply with before they may receive this privilege, primarily the acceptance and signing of OA declarations (Wickham, 2011). Interview data from the university librarians revealed that only two out of the seven selected universities had signed such declarations. (Note that this research did not investigate the impact of processing fees on the use of OA journals for scholarly communication by academics in Ethiopian universities.)

Academics’ perception of OA journals After having established the existing OA environment in the selected universities in Ethiopia, we turned our attention to assessing the attitude of the academics towards OA journals. The results are discussed in the following sections and they show that people have different perceptions of OA. For example, Nick Milks commented on The Telegraph blog that ‘‘Open Access is strange. What other industry, does the journalist pay for his own article?’’

Standards of quality of OA journals Figure 4 shows that 308 (55 percent) respondents agreed that OA journals had adequate standards of quality, although their degree of agreement varied, with 133 (23 percent) strongly agreeing and 127 (22 percent) academics disagreeing. A relatively large number of academics, that is, 131 (23 percent) were

uncertain whether OA journals had adequate standards of quality. A study that assessed 20 institutions and a total of 1676 respondents’ attitudes towards OA revealed that the majority of academics were in favour of OA, with 85 percent either strongly or slightly in favour of OA (Wickham, 2011). Similarly, the results presented in the current study show that more than half of respondents in all universities agreed that OA journals have adequate standards of quality. This means that users are not only willing to access OA journals, but may also be willing to publish in them. However, research carried out by Frass, Cross and Gardner (2013) on behalf of Taylor and Francis revealed that out of 14,587 respondents, 10 percent strongly agreed that open access journals had lower quality than subscription journals, 24 percent agreed, 33 percent had no opinion, 20 percent disagreed and 12 percent strongly disagreed. The fact that 12 percent disagreed is instructive given that the survey was carried out among people who were mainly publishing in subscription journals. It would not be surprising if an element of bias against OA journals crept in.

Peer reviewing journals Figure 5 demonstrates that 163 (29 percent) academics responded positively to the statement that OA journals were not peer-reviewed. On the other hand, 262 (46 percent) did not agree with the statement.

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Figure 5. OA journals not peer-reviewed (N ¼ 566).

The negative perception of OA journals by the respondents is not surprising, given the myths surrounding OA (BioMed Central, 2013; Calder Communications Library, n.d.). The misconception about the quality and peer-review regime of OA journals was evident in the report of the United Kingdom Select Committee on Science and Technology (2004). The Directory of Open Access Journals (n.d.) also boasts of being a source of ‘‘free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals, covering all subjects and many languages’’. The reality is that just because a journal article is publicly available without a subscription does not mean it did not go through the traditional peer-review process. So misconceptions about and arguments against open access are gradually fading.

Open access journal articles are not copyrighted Copyright is an area of concern for university libraries and authors worldwide in relation to OA journals. According to Swan and Brown (2007), researchers frequently raise copyright issues as a barrier to depositing their work on open access repositories. They further noted that it is not always because they are prevented from doing so by copyright issues; more

often it is simply a case of being unsure of what is permissible and what is not. Copyright in OA journals operates in more or less the same way as for traditional subscription journals. The lack of clarity among academics pertaining to copyright issues in relation to OA journals is shown in Figure 6. The persistence of myths about copyright was demonstrated by 231 (41 percent) academics, who agreed – ranging from agree (219) to strongly agree (32) – that OA articles were not copyrighted. The fact that as many as 167 (30 percent) academics did not know whether or not OA articles were copyrighted paints a gloomy picture of the perceptions among academics in Ethiopia. The fact that only 148 (26 percent) of the academics said that the articles were copyrighted is revealing. This implies that at least two-thirds of respondents did not have a clear understanding of whether OA articles were copyrighted or not. Hence, in the future, university libraries are expected to provide training for users to dispel these misconceptions about OA journals.

Open access journals have a lower impact factor Academics are concerned about the impact that they make in the scientific community. Publishing in

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Figure 6. Open-access journals not copyrighted (N ¼ 566).

high-impact factor journals is one of the ways that academics may use to gauge the impact of their research outputs. The higher the impact factor the journal has, the more highly regarded and prestigious the research becomes. Despite the fact that some scholars challenge the thinking, the impact factor is considered to be one of the criteria of reputability of journals. Hence, instructors and researchers strive to publish in those journals that have a high impact factor to secure their promotion within the academic ranks of universities. Figure 7 depicts the perception of academics in Ethiopia towards the impact factor of OA articles. Only 158 (30) disagreed that OA journals had a lower impact factor. Given that 173 (31 percent) academics did not know whether OA journals had a lower impact factor or not, it shows that, despite the majority of academics knowing about OA journals before the survey, they did not have adequate understanding of OA journals. As a result, they are uncertain whether or not to publish in such journals. In this regard, the finding of this study is partially consistent with Swan and Brown (2007), who found that although many academics were informed about OA, many were unclear about how to provide it. Although citation is influenced by the relevance and importance of a given scholarly work to other scholars in the field (Craig et al., 2007), there is evidence that OA research

articles have a greater citation impact. However, the misgivings about the impact of OA journals persist. For instance, Nick Milks commented on The Telegraph blog: ‘‘Articles don’t get any recognition, or publicity, unless they’re associated with the big journal brands’’ (Collins, 2013). Similarly, many interviewed respondents also reported that universities should subscribe to high impact factor journals through making arrangements with reputable publishers.

Open access as a solution to increase accessibility of e-information resources One of the objectives of this study was to investigate OA as a possibility to increase accessibility to e-information resources in the HLIs of Ethiopia. In this regard, academics were asked whether they thought OA could enhance accessibility of e-information resources or not. It is evident that the majority (81 percent) of the respondents reported that OA provided a window of opportunity for academics to gain access to e-information resources. Interview data revealed that some academics regarded OA as a possible solution to increasing accessibility of e-information resources in the HLIs of Ethiopia. The following is a list of their verbatim comments:

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Figure 7. Open-access journals have a lower impact factor (N ¼ 566). Open access should be expedited and must be easily accessible at the university level in order to capacitate academic and research and development staff in the university at large. Open access may be the best tools in research communication if they are properly and timely provided. Open access are quite important for HLIs, due to the fact that in the 21st century research findings, teaching materials and e-journals cannot easily be available on time and in the required standards without e-information. Yes, we know that HLIs are areas where young scientists will be produced so that in these areas there is a need of open access and repositories so that there is no question for their existence in the future, we all should advertise and advocate it.

I agree 100 percent that open access journals will help improve the quality of education. As a passing remark, there were few comments which say that the term open access was new to them. Sometimes, instructors and researchers have already been using open access journals, but they didn’t know these jargons (technical terms).

On the whole, academics suggested that OA may increase accessibility of e-journals, both in their respective libraries and at HLIs in Ethiopia in general. These results show that open access will not only enhance the productivity of academics, but may also increase their visibility by disseminating knowledge (research outputs) from the southern hemisphere to the northern hemisphere.

Conclusions and recommendations Thanks to technology, for globalization, open access is necessary for universities. Because of this the government should give due attention to the importance of e-information resources. The university ‘‘must’’ have open access. Open access resources contribute to educational quality, so the university must engaged with them aggressively. Open access journals are an alternate to subscribed journals.

The findings of the study revealed that the majority of academics 566 (78 percent) knew about OA before the survey. They also revealed that more than half of the respondents agreed that OA journals had adequate standards of quality and scientific merit. Therefore, the study concludes that academics are already benefiting from OA journals and are using them as an alternative access model to access e-journals and to publish in them. However, some respondents reported that they were not clear about the issues regarding copyright and the impact factor of OA journals. Therefore, this study recommends that

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university librarians assume two bold responsibilities: First, they should increase awareness and accessibility of OA journals among users through promotion and training. Second, university librarians should make academics aware of the benefits of publishing in OA journals and archiving their intellectual products, at least in their respective institutional repositories. However, in order to help academics, this study recommends that university librarians first be converted to the OA movement themselves. Only once they become knowledgeable about the issues involved will they be able to serve the users better. This study also revealed that the three major ways that respondents became aware of open access journals were through Internet searching, friends and colleagues, and librarians. Thus, it can be concluded that academics got acquainted with OA through a mix of different approaches, that is, formally and informally. Moreover, the majority of academics indicated that OA journals could be a possible solution to increase accessibility of e-information resources. This study concludes that academics are already aware of some of the benefits of OA. Users consider OA journals to be an alternative access model and thus a solution to the serials crisis. Therefore, this study recommends that users and university librarians continue maximizing the benefits of open access by using it to complement (and in the long run, as a substitution for) the existing conventional journals subscription model. In so doing, university libraries can make local research results visible worldwide. Moreover, academics in the HLIs of Ethiopia may then be in a better position to contribute to the accumulated world knowledge, rather than merely being consumers of it. In short, even if OA is not a panacea, it could offer potential solutions to increase accessibility of e-information resources in the HLIs of Ethiopia. Therefore, this study recommends OA as the access and publishing model for academics in Ethiopia. However, in order to actualise these benefits, stakeholders and partners in the e-information resources access provision continuum (demand side, intermediaries and supply side) should work closely together. And university librarians, in particular, should take responsible ownership of the process. The results of this study should be generalized to the Ethiopian context with caution since a sample of HLI institutions was investigated. Similarly, studies should be conducted to test the reliability of the findings in other institutions in Ethiopia. Further, the study was guided by a conceptual framework that is

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UNESCO (Netherlands National Commission for UNESCO) (2011) A global perspective on open access. Retrieved February 2, 2013, from http://www.unesco. org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CI/CI/pdf/them es/access_to_knowledge_societies/open_access/en%20%20UNESCO%20expert%20meeting%20Open%20Acc ess%20conclusions.pdf Waaijers L (2009) Publish and cherish with non-proprietary peer review systems. Ariadne (59). Retrieved December 19, 2010, from http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/ issues59/waaijers/ Wickham J (2011) Unlocking attitudes to open accesssurvey results. Retrieved December 16, 2012, from http://rspproject.wordpress.com/2011/03/04/unlockingattitudes-to-openaccess-in-the-uk/ World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) (2003) WSIS declaration of principles – building the information society: a global challenge in the new millennium. WSIS03/GENEVA/DOC/4-E. Retrieved January 21, 2012, from http://www.itu.int/wsis/docs/geneva/official/dop.html Wyatt S (2010) Digitizing social sciences and humanities: global challenges and opportunities, in Caillods F. (Ed.) World social science report: knowledge divides (pp. 303–306). Paris: UNESCO Publishing and International Social Science Council. Yiotis K (2005) The open access initiative: a new paradigm for scholarly communications. Information Technology and Libraries 24(4): 157–62. About the authors Yared Mammo is Assistant Professor of information science at Haramaya University. He served 13 years as a Director of Library and Information Services. He has presented papers in different national, regional and international conferences; and served as a training resources person. His research interests include open access, access to electronic resources by academics and management of electronic resources in academic libraries. Contact: Yared Mammo, Assistant Professor, Haramaya University, PO Box 138, Haramaya, Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. Email: [email protected] Patrick Ngulube is a professor of Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Studies at the University of South Africa (UNISA) and has served in various portfolios within the East and Southern Africa Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives (ESARBICA). His research interests are indigenous knowledge systems, knowledge management, records management, e-government and the preservation of access to information. Contact: School of Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Studies, University of South Africa, PO Box 392, UNISA, 0003, South Africa. Email: [email protected]

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