Introduction

Ukraine has a legislative mandate requiring open access (OA) to publicly funded research. There are  active Informatio-Consortium Association and ELibUkr projects that  partnered with EIFL for raising OA awareness and sharing resources. There is strong community of practice  for OA and the development of OA  repositories by universities and research organizations  and over 40 repositories have been set up in Ukraine, most of which are based at academic institutions.

OpenDOAR (Directory of OA Repositories) lists Ukraine among top ten countries in Europe according to the proportion of repositories by country (103 repositories as of March 2021).

The Institute of Software Systems, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, and Zhytomyr Ivan Franko State University set up a national harvester http://oai.org.ua/ to enable centralized search in all OA repositories of Ukraine. DOAJ currently indexes 371 Ukrainian OA journals. And there are 21 OA institutional policies adopted in the country that are registered in ROARMAP. (some of them include Donetsk National Technical University, Kharkov National Medical University, Sumy State University, Ternopil State Ivan Puluj Technical University, Ukrainian Academy of Banking of the National Bank of Ukraine, V.N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, Charitable Foundation National University Kyiv Mohyla Academy).

Some of the open access projects undertaken were:

• Central and Eastern European Marine Repository (CEEMaR): a thematic digital repository covering the marine, brackish and freshwater environments and providing access to papers produced by staff of the ECET countries Institutes.
• Institute of Biology of the Southern Seas (IBSS): a digital depository focussing on marine biology, ecology of the region.
• Institute of Software Systems (ISS): a thematic repository on software at National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.
• Old Printed Books: a digital depository of European Rarities at Kyiv National Taras Shevchenko University.

Enabling Environment

In June 2012 participants of the 19th International Crimean Conference "Crimea 2012: Libraries and information resources in the modern world of science, culture, education and business ” adopted Crimea Open Access Manifesto.

In 2009, an Open Access to Knowledge statement was endorsed by 150 university librarians at the International conference Libraries of the higher education institutions Sevastopol, Ukraine; 26 University rectors endorsed Open Access to research information in the Olvia declaration of the Universities: Academic Freedom, University Autonomy, Science & Education for Sustainable Development; and Belgorod Declaration on Open Access to scientific knowledge and cultural heritage was endorsed by rectors in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine.

In 2007 legislation was passed requiring open access to publicly funded research (Law of Ukraine On the Principles of Developing Information Society in Ukraine in 2007-2015).

National and Institutional Level Policies/Mandates

2007 Ukraine legislative mandate for open access to publicly funded research.

Olvia Declaration of the Universities: Academic Freedom, University Autonomy, Science and Education for Sustainable Development, endorsed by 26 rectors of Ukrainian universities in Yalta, Crimea, on June 12, 2009 includes an OA endorsement.

Ukraine government requires deposit of publicly funded research outcomes in OA repositories.

Seven OA institutional policies have been adopted in Donetsk National Technical University, Kharkov National Medical University, Sumy State University, Ternopil State Ivan Puluj Technical University, Ukrainian Academy of Banking of the National Bank of Ukraine, V.N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, Charitable Foundation NaUKMA.

Potential Barriers

Yaroshenko, T (2011) identifies these as including: lack of administration support; lack of OA awareness and misperceptions among researchers; a fear to disrupt relationships with publishers; lack of time/unwillingness to self-archive; established practice to upload publications to personal or departmental websites without seeing any advantages in depositing into OA repositories; lack of qualitative indicators of OA in the universities; limited technical capacities in the universities; and poorly implemented policies of OA institutional repositories.

Key Organizations

Kyiv Mohyla Foundation of America

Electronic Library of Ukraine: Knowledge Centers in Universities of Ukraine (ELibUkr) project was established in 2008 with the support of the Kyiv Mohyla Foundation of America and with the initial financial support of USAID. Currently there are over 20 project partners. ELibUkr aims to ensure the widest possible dissemination of Ukrainian research output. (Yaroshenko, T, 2011). Among other activities the project encourages setting up OA repositories, provides capacity building and policy development support, promotes OA among researchers and research managers. The project maintains the directory of OA repositories in Ukraine and set up a national shared OA repository for researchers that don't have their OA institutional repositories. In 2011 Association "Informatio-Consortium" with the partners: Ukrainian Library Association, ELibUkr Consortium and The Mohyla School of Journalism (National University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy, NaUKMA) implemented EIFL funded national OA advocacy campaign “OA in Ukraine: from islands to global village”. The promo film  was released that provides introduction to OA and showcases prominent researchers and research administrators talking about OA. Over 530 researchers and students, research managers, editors and librarians learned about OA strategies and benefits, when attending six workshops hosted by university/academic libraries in Lviv (Lviv Ivan Franko National University), Sevastopol (Sevastopol National Technical University, International Conference “Informatio-2011"), Kharkiv (Kharkiv Karazin National University), Kyiv (NaUKMA and State Culture and Arts Management Academy), Mykolaiv (Mykolaiv National Admiral Makarov Shipbuilding University) and Vinnytsya (Vinnytsya Regional Universal Research Library). See more details about the project.

OPTIMA (Open Practices, Transparency and Integrity for Modern Academia): In 2021, EIFL joined a partnership to start a new, Erasmus+ funded project that will promote openness and transparency in research by fostering open science practices among early career researchers and others who are interested. The OPTIMA (Open Practices, Transparency and Integrity for Modern Academia) project will create an online open peer review platform for academic conferences and build an international virtual community of peer reviewers. The open peer review platform will provide hands-on learning opportunities for early career researchers, helping to build new skills under the collective mentorship of international experts. EIFL’s main contribution to the OPTIMA project will be to develop generic and discipline-specific open science courses for Masters students and PhD candidates. The courses will be offered in five Ukrainian universities.

Omidyar Network is a philanthropic investment firm dedicated to harnessing the power of markets to create opportunity for people to improve their lives. Omidyar Network was established in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam. The organization invests in and helps scale innovative organizations to catalyze economic and social change. Omidyar Network has committed more than $1 billion to for-profit companies and non-profit organizations that foster economic advancement and encourage individual participation across multiple initiatives, including Digital Identity, Education, Emerging Tech, Financial Inclusion, Governance & Citizen Engagement, and Property Rights. 

The Open Society Foundation is a Ukrainian NGO established in 2001 to promote the values ​​of open society in the Ukrainian agenda, to increase the efficiency and accountability of public policy. It is a community of analysts, experts and managers, who cooperate with government agencies to analyze policies, develop and implement recommendations in areas of competence, including good governance, transparency and efficiency in using public finance and sustainable development.

The foundation aims to develop innovative tools for transparency in natural resources and environment management, monitoring environmental health. Through these and other initiatives, the organization has been working to strengthen the capacity of civil society groups to exercise effective public control and ensure broad involvement and representation in the decision-making process. 

Informatio-Consortium Association

Overview: Consortium of 47 academic, special and public libraries in Ukraine in partnership with EIFL to collective access e-resources, provide training on marketing of and advocacy for libraries, development of OA institutional repositories, intellectual property advocacy, use of open source software, OA advocacy, general and technical support and consulting services to members.

Events and Programmes

• OpenCon 2014 Kiev held an open seminar for the Ukrainian faculty Professional development: open recourses, digital science and international publications, aimed to promote Open Access to the scientific literature and statistical data.The organizers of the seminar were the Kyiv School of Economics and ProstoScience project, this event takes place in the framework of the international conference OpenCon 2014. The purpose of the seminar was to share with Ukrainian Faculty resources that will be useful for their teaching and research. Also, participants learned about the basic statistical data resources that are necessary for economic research, and the possibility of obtaining grants. The seminar was designed specifically for faculty of economic disciplines, working in higher education, who are focused on their professional development and on innovation in their work. This one-day scientific workshop combinen expert presentations, discussion of the latest trends in the field of access to scientific resources and training, in particular such issues as:
  • access to open academic resources and statistics
  • tools for open scientific cooperation
  • the possibility of obtaining grants for faculty
  • the ability to publish articles in international journals
  • tools to detect plagiarism

International Open Access Week Celebrations:

• How to find the information for learning and research activity in open access sources, 2020-10-22, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific and Technical Library Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Politechnic Institute, Type: webinar
• Altmetric tool for evaluating open science, 2020-10-22, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific and Technical Library ONAFT, Type: webinar
• Autumn Scientific School, 2018-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library of NU "OLA", Type: school
• Open Access ft. Science 2.0, 2018-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Olga Olshevska, Type: workshop
• IEEE STYLE – International Citation and Reference Style for Academic Papers, 2018-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by KPI Library, Type: workshop, seminar
• Institutional Repository ELAKPI: How Can We Create the High-Quality University e-Collection by Common Efforts, 2018-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by KPI Library, Type: workshop, seminar
• Programming vs. Copyright ft. Copyleft, 2018-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Olga Olshevska, Type: workshop
• Autumn Scientific School, 2017-10-31, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library of NU "OLA", Type: school
• Open Access Week at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, 2017-10-27, Ukraine, Organized by Tetiana Yaroshenko,
• Presentation of the 5th issue of the "Open Access Resources" website guide (published by the Scientific Library of NUOS), 2017-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library NUOS, Type: presentation
• Overview, 2017-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by Svitla Natalia, Type: overview
• Presentation, 2017-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by Svitla Natalia, Type: presentation
• Open Access Week at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, 2017-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by Tetiana Yaroshenko, Type: presentation
• Open Access Week at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, 2017-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Tetiana Yaroshenko, Type: workshop
• Cемінар «Інтернет, бібліотеки, авторське право: взаємодія у правовому полі» у Публічній бібліотеці імені Лесі Українки (м.Київ), 2017-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Oleksii Vasyliev, Type: seminar
• "Open Archives – Open Science", 2017-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library NUOS, Type: workshop
• Open Access Week in Academic Scientific Library of The National University of Ostroh Academy, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Yuriy Kotsyuk, Type: workshop
• Open Access Week 2017 in the Maksymovych Scientific Library, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by The Maksymovych Scientific Library of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Type: seminar, workshop
• Open Access Week 2017 in The Scientific and Technical Library National Technical University of Ukraine “Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute”, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by KPI Library, Type: workshop, seminar, flashmob
• Open Access Week 2017 with SciPress at Scientific Library of the National Mining University of Ukraine, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by SciPress Ltd., Type: oa, event, presentation, information
• Round Table "Open Access - Open Opportunities", 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Marina Alekseevna Podrezova, Type: round, table
• Flash Mob "ISupportOpenAccess", 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library NUOS, Type: flashmob
• Open Access Week at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Tetiana Yaroshenko, Type: open, access, films, discussion
• "Open access – open opportunities", 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library NUOS, Type: workshop
• Flashmob “Open the Lock”, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by KPI Library, Type: flashmob
• All-Ukrainian “Open the Lock”, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by The Maksymovych Scientific Library, KPI Library, The Scientific Library of the National Mining University of Ukraine, Scientific Library NUOS, O.M.Beketov National University of Urban Economy in Kharkiv, The Scientific Library National Pedagogic..., Type: flashmob
• Flashmob "Open the lock", 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library NUOS, Type: flashmob
• Open Access Week 2017, 2017-10-23, Ukraine, Organized by O.M.Beketov National University of Urban Economy in Kharkiv, Type: event, presentation, information
• Marathon on adding the links and citations from the open access sources to the Ukrainian segment of Wikipedia, 2016-10-28, Ukraine, Organized by National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Type: marathon
• Рublication in the open access and the effectiveness of their citation, 2016-10-28, Ukraine, Organized by Pyatkova, Type: seminar
• Training for Scientists “Effective Representation of the Research Results in Open Access”, 2016-10-27, Ukraine, Organized by National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Type: training
• Invitation to the world of books… Antiquarian and Rare books in the University Library, 2016-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Marina Alekseevna Podrezova, Type: open
• LitPro Book Supply Management System in the National University of Ostroh Academy, 2016-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by The National University of Ostroh Academy, Type: seminar
• Open Access: what to do now that not to lose tomorrow, 2016-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Marina Alekseevna Podrezova, Type: workshop
• Open Access Week 2016 in NUOS, Ukraine, 2016-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library of Admiral Makarov National University of Shipbuilding, Type: workshop
• Open Access: What every scientist should know, 2016-10-26, Ukraine, Organized by Alina Synytska, Type: seminar
• Open Access to Scientific Information: Who, Why and How, 2016-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by Oksana Brui, Type: seminar
• Supporting Open Access movement: self archiving in National Technical University "Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute", 2016-10-25, Ukraine, Organized by Yulyia Glavcheva, Type: seminar
• Open Access Week to library resources for the scientific community of the city, 2016-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Marina Alekseevna Podrezova, Type: open
• International Open Access Week on the  on the library website, 2016-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Naugolnova Nelia G., Type: web, page
• Library OSACEaA, 2016-10-24, Ukraine, Organized by Library Odessa State Academy of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Type: advice, presentation, stand, design
• Supporting Open Access movement: from the scientists’ self-archiving to the web-rating of the institution, 2016-10-21, Ukraine, Organized by Scientific Library, Type: master, class
• Supporting Open Access movement: self archiving in Ukrainian Catholic University, 2016-10-20, Ukraine, Organized by Alina Synytska, Type: workshop
• How to make your own work Open Access, 2016-10-20, Ukraine, Organized by Alina Synytska, Type: seminar
• Open days for first-year students, 2016-10-19, Ukraine, Organized by Biblioteka UMSA, Type: excursion
• 23 October 2014: Workshop "Journals of National Technical University of Ukraine on Platform open journal Systems (OJS)"
• 22 October 2014: Workshop "Open Access e-Resources on Medicine"-  Participants got information on the major open access medical databases and special open access initiatives from commercial scientific publishers.
• 21 October 2014: International Conferences of National Technical University of Ukraine on Platform Open Conference Systems.
• 30 January-1 February 2014: Scientific Communication in the Digital Age (OA is among the topics); Kiev, Ukraine.
• National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (NAS) and EIFL held a conference on OA journals in 2004.
• February 17-19, 2005, hosted by National University Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, organized by International Renaissance Foundation, OSI, NAS, International Association of Academies of Sciences, supported by East-East Program: Partnership Beyond Borders of OSI and the British Council Ukraine.
• INFORMATIO 2007: IV International Conference on Electronic Information Resources Design, Use and Access, 2-5 October 2007, Alushta, Ukraine.
• INFORMATIO 2010 International Conference on Electronic Information Resources Design, Use and Access, October 2010, Kyiv, Ukraine.
• INFORMATIO 2011 International Conference on Electronic Information Resources Design, Use and Access, October  2011, Sevastopol, Ukraine.

Publications

• Andrukhiv, A and Samotyj, R The role of Lviv Polytechnic National University Scientific Library in the development of Open Scholarly Communication in Ukraine.
• Chan, L, Kirsop B and Arunachalam, S (2005) Open access archiving: the fast track to building research capacity in developing countries.
• Haigh, M & Haigh, T The Red Route to Open Access? Scholarly Publishing and the Politics of National Identity in Post-Soviet Ukraine.
• Haigh, M. (2009) "Making Ukrainians in the Library: Language, Libraries and National Identity." Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science 33(3-4): 141-159.
• Kuchma, I (2007) Developing National Open Access Policies: An Ukrainian Case Study Proceedings ELPUB2007 Conference on Electronic Publishing, Vienna, Austria, June 2007.
• Kuchma, I (2008) Open Access in Ukraine: Cooperation with the policy makers. Open Access Repositories Workshop, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.
• Kuchma, I (2008) Open Access Institutional Repositories in Developing and Transition Countries: Results of eIFL.net Activities. In: Third International Conference on Open Repositories 2008, 1-4 April 2008, Southampton, United Kingdom.
• Kuchma, I (2008) Open Access, Equity, and Strong Economy in Developing and Transition Countries: Policy Perspective. Serials Review 34:1:13-20.
• Kuchma, I (2009) Libraries advocating for open access in Ukraine, eIFL.net, May 2009.
• Kuchma, I. 2007. “Developing National Open Access Policies: An Ukrainian Case Study.” Pp. 463–64 in Openness in Digital Publishing: Awareness, Discovery and Access - Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Electronic Publishing, ELPUB 2007.
• Kuchma, I. 2008. “Open Access, Equity, and Strong Economy in Developing and Transition Countries: Policy Perspective.” Serials Review 34(1):13–20. doi: 10.1016/j.serrev.2007.12.004.
• Kuchma, I., Hagemann, M., & Kupryte, R. (2006) Open access: OSI and eIFL’s work on the international level, activities in Ukraine on the national level, 2006. In 6. seminar za knji啪nice u sustavu znanosti i visoke naobrazbe, Zagreb (Croatia), 3-4 March 2006. (Unpublished) [Presentation].
• Lande, D., V. Andrushchenko, and I. Balagura. 2018. “Data Science in Open-Access Research on-Line Resources.” Pp. 17–20 in Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE 2nd International Conference on Data Stream Mining and Processing, DSMP 2018.
• Nazarovets, S. A. 2018. “Black Open Access in Ukraine: Analysis of Downloading Sci-Hub Publications by Ukrainian Internet Users.” Science and Innovation 14(2):19–24. doi: 10.15407/scine14.02.019.
• Novikov, A. 2020. “The Splendors and Miseries of Open Access Scientific Publishing in Ukraine.” Publications 8(1). doi: 10.3390/PUBLICATIONS8010016.
• Piskozub, A., D. Levytskyy, I. Rudyk, and L. Rakobovchuk. 2009. “The Automatization of Information Security of Local Calculation Network with the Open Access to Internet on FreeBSD Base.” Pp. 465–67 in Experience of Designing and Application of CAD Systems in Microelectronics - Proceedings of the 10th International Conference, CADSM 2009.
• Rada, V. OA Self-Archiving Policy: The Parliament of Ukraine.
• Yaroshenko, T (2011) Open Access: Ukrainian landscape Paper presented at "Libraries for An Open Environment: strategies, technologies and partnerships", IATUL Conference, May 2011.
• Yaroshenko, T, Vasyliev, O. (2012) “Open Access in Ukraine: From Islands to Global Village Project, a Case Study from Ukraine: www.eifl.net/system/files/201202/oa-casestudyukraine-final.pdf