Introduction

Lithuania has 47 State higher education establishments; 20 non-State higher education establishments, 19 research institutes and university research institutes and others.

Since 2006 Electronic Academic Library of Lithuania (eLABa) has operated as the national OA repository of the Ministry of Education and Science and all academic institutions in Lithuania. The fundamentals of the eLABa were laid in the course of the project Lithuanian Academic Libraries Network (LABT) and the initial online database of thesis and dissertations (ETD) in 2003. The eLABa stores more than 29 thousands documents of all types from 6 collections.

Lithuania has an EIFL representation through Lithuanian Research Library Consortium (LMBA).

As of March 2021, there are 17 OA digital repositories registered in OpenDOAR. 88 OA journals are listed in DOAJ. There are currently 12 institutional OA policies registered in ROARMAP.

On 8 July 2015, the Research Council of Lithuania held a seminar "Policies on Open Access to Scientific Results: Present Day Situation and Future Goals". This marks the beginning of the series of discussions and open consultations in the country with the aim to develop the Policy on Open Access to scientific publications and data in Lithuania by end of 2015. 

An important role in the stakeholder dialogues is played by the Lithuanian National Commission for UNESCO which invited stakeholders to focus on this area of expertise. The first meeting of various institutions linked to the OA to scientific information representatives was held in January 2013. The participants expressed a need to form a working group constituted from various authorities and stakeholders that could summarize the situation in Lithuania and provide suggestions for further development. This kind of group was formed by the Lithuanian National Commission for UNESCO in February 2013. The group was composed of the representatives of LMBA, the RCL, the Ministry of Education and Science, the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, the Vilnius University library, the Lithuanian Society of Young Researchers, the Research and Higher Education Monitoring and Analysis Centre (MOSTA), and the Agency for Science, Innovation and Technology (MITA)

Enabling Environment

The Ministry of Education established eLABa, a national depository system to provide the environment to deposit and access electronic documents using Fedora infrastructure software. Its use is voluntary and mostly by universities as a research depository. In 2009 legislation required the results of scientific activity to be made publicly available.

The Lithuanian Research Library Consortium (LMBA) represents academic libraries and is responsible for most of the OA activity in the country through its membership of EIFL.

National and Institutional Level Policies/Mandates

The new law on Science and Studies of the Republic of Lithuania (2009) requires the results of scientific activity to be made publicly available.

Potential Barriers

There is currently no national OA mandate in Lithuania; but seminar was held on 8 July 2015, which addressed the country's need for developing an OA Policy and hoped to change this situation by the end of 2015.

Key Organizations

Lithuanian Research Library Consortium (LMBA)

Overview: Representative group of 52 academic library members with whom OA initiatives are developed through EIFL.

Communication address: Gedimino Avenue 51, LT-01504 Vilnius, Lithuania; e-mail: lmba(at)lnb.lt.

The Electronic Academic Library of Lithuania (eLABa) is the national OA repository of the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport and all academic institutions of Lithuania. Fifty institutions in Lithuania (universities, institutes and research centres) are members of the eLABa Consortium.

Open Access to Science and Research (MITAP)

Project coordinator: Agency for Science, Innovation and Technology (MITA); Project duration: 2012-12-28 – 2015-08-28; Project funded by: European Social Fund

The aim of the project – facilitating technology transfer in open access Centres with the aim of strengthening the international competitiveness of Lithuanian researchers in the European research area.

The main goals of the project:

●      Granting public access to scientific knowledge and R&D output;

●      Publicity of activities of open access centres;

●      Organisation and execution of technology transfer activities in open access centres.

Since 2006 the RCL in cooperation with Lithuanian educational institutions and libraries manages thedatabase

Lituanistika, which aims to accumulate and disseminate certified, high-quality information about research in Lithuanian studies in Lithuania and in the world. The Lituanistika database is created according to the projects supported by the European Structural Funds. This database is planned to be used and developed in the period 2015–2020.

Research Council of Lithuania (RCL) agreed to take on the mission to be a coordinating body concerning OA issues at the end of 2013.Concrete policies and implementation plans areexpected to be developed in the coming few years. Animportant input for this issue is expected from the FP7 project PASTEUR4OA (Open Access PolicyAlignment Strategies for European Union Research)that aims to support the European Commission’s Recommendation to Member States of July 2012 that they develop and implement policies to ensure OA toall outputs from publicly-funded research. This PASTEUR4OA project started in February 2014, and the RCL is a project Partner.

Events and Programs

●      Open Access Escape Room / Atvirosios prieigos pabėgimo kambarys, 2019-10-21, Lithuania, Organized by Rasa Dovidonytė, Type: escape, room

●      9th UNICA Scholarly Communication Seminar on Academic Libraries & Open Science: how to meet the challenges?, 14 Oct 2019 - 15 Oct 2019, Vilnius, Lithuania

●      RESEARCH DATA MANAGEMENT TRAINING FOR PHDS, 03 Apr 2019, Kaunas, Lithuania

●      OpenCon 2017 Lithuania: Towards Open Research Data and Open Science in Lithuania, 2017-10-23, Lithuania, Organized by Kaunas University of Technology Library, Type: conference

●      OPEN SCIENCE BOOTCAMP IN LITHUANIA, 2 Apr 2019, Kaunas, Lithuania

●      OPEN SCIENCE TRAINING FOR PHD STUDENTS, 21 Aug 2017 - 25 Aug 2017, Palanga, Lithuania

●      ACADEMIC LIBRARIES AND OPEN SCIENCE, 06 Dec 2016, Kaunas, Lithuania

●      Conference Lithuanian Journals Meeting the Needs of Digital Scholarly Communication, 2016-10-25, Lithuania, Organized by Eleonora Dagienė, Type: conference

●      Openly about Open Access: funding and publications, 2015-10-23, Lithuania, Organized by Eleonora Dagienė, Type: discussion

●      Open Access Alias Party at Lunch, 2015-10-19, Lithuania, Organized by Eleonora Dagienė

●      PROMOTING OPEN SCIENCE AMONG YOUNG RESEARCHERS: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES, 9 Oct 2015, Kaunas, Lithuania

●      OPEN ACCESS IN LITHUANIA: AIMS AND CHALLENGES, 25 Sep 2015, Vilnius, Lithuania

●      OPEN ACCESS POLICY SEMINAR IN VILNIUS, 08 Jul 2015, Vilnius, Lithuania

●      PASTEUR4OA PROJECT MID-TERM MEETING, 13 May 2015, Brussels, Belgium

●      PROMOTING OPEN SCIENCE AMONG YOUNG RESEARCHERS, 15 Apr 2015, Kaunas and Vilnius, Lithuania

●      OPENAIRE2020 KICK-OFF MEETING, 28 Jan 2015 - 29 Jan 2015, Athens, Greece

●      Open Science: what is it for me, 2012-10-18, Lithuania, Organized by Gintare Tautkeviciene, Type: workshop

●      Open Access Week 2011 in Lithuania, 2011-10-27, Lithuania, Organized by Lithuanian Research Library Consortium, gintare.tautkeviciene@ktu.lt, Type: conference

●      Open Access Week 2010 in Lithuania, 2010-10-21, Lithuania, Organized by Lithuanian Research Library Association, Type: conference

●      26 October 2012: Open discussion "The OA development in Lithuania"- The open discussion among young researchers,representatives of research funding institutions, science authorities, publishers, librarians and other open access stakeholders was organized by Kaunas University of Technology in partnership with The Lithuanian Society of Young Researchers, The Association of Lithuanian Serials, The Lithuanian Research Libraries Consortium. This event completed the series of workshops organized with the support of EIFL.

●      OA week 2011 in Lithuania

●      OA week 2010 in Lithuania

●      LMBA have been actively promoting OA since 2005. Various events http://www.lmba.lt/en/open-access/events  (seminars, round-table discussions and presentations delivered by the OA supporters at the national and international levels) play an important role in advocating for the OA ideas in Lithuania.

●     International Conference "Dissemination Possibilities for Lithuanian Research Journals in the World" was held in 2010. Following the OA Weeks 2010, 20 journals adopted the Open Journal System to assist in the OA publishing process. Now OJS is used by 23 journals. 33 journals published in Lithuania were registered in the DOAJ catalogue in 2012.

Publications

●     Gintare Tautkevičienė, Rūta Petrauskaitė, Brigita Serafinavičiūtė; "Open Access in Lithuania" Sciecom Info 2 (2014)

●     National Open Access and Preservation Policies in Europe: Analysis of a Questionnaire to the European Research Area Committee; EUROPEAN UNION, 2011.

●     Banionytė, Emilija; Vaškevičienė, Aušra; Tautkevičienė, Gintarė. Interviews with Lithuanian Polticians and Famous Researchers about Open Access. From Scienscominfo: Nordic-Baltic Forum for Scientific Communication, 2011, 7, 3.

●     Dagienė, E. (2012). Promoting open access via implementing Open Journal System: case study.

●     Dagienė, E (2011) Changes in Lithuanian research journal publishing in 2009–2010 Sciecom Info Vol.7, 1. (CC).

●     Kuprienė, J and Petrauskienė, Z (2009) Open access to scientific publications: the situation in Lithuania Sciecom Info Vol 5, 2. (CC).

●     Kretavičienė, M. (2008) The Meeting on Open Access in the European Union and Lithuania, 7th May 2008. Scienscominfo: Nordic-Baltic Forum for Scientific Communication, 2008, vol. 4 no. 2 (CC). ISSN 1652-3202.

●     Kretaviėienė, M (2009) Experiences of Lithuanian DOAJ-journal. Scienscominfo: Nordic-Baltic Forum for Scientific Communication, 2009, vol. 5, no. 1 (CC). ISSN 1652-3202.

●     Tautkevicienė, G, Kuchma, I and Cesevičiute, I (2009) The role of open access in the scholarly communication process. In Changes in Social and Business Environment: proceedings of the 3rd international conference, November 4-5, 2009, Kaunas University of Technology Panevėžys Institute, Lithuania: selected papers. Kaunas: Technologija, 2009, p. 438—444. ISBN 1822-7090.

●     Tautkevičienė, G, et al. (2010) Integration of the Lithuanian academic e-Library (eLABa) into the international open access infrastructure. Scienscominfo: Nordic-Baltic Forum for Scientific Communication, 2010, Vol. 6, No. 3. ISSN 1652-3202.

●     Tautkevičienė, G, et. al. (2011). Demand for and practice of developing information competencies among researchers. In Libraries for An Open Environment: strategies, technologies and partnerships: IATUL 32nd Conference, May 29 – June 2, 2011, Warsaw.

●     Tautkevičienė, G. (2012). Promoting Open Access in Lithuania: case study. http://www.eifl.net/system/files/201202/oa-case-studylithuania-oaadvocacy-final.pdf