Four of the UK's leading research organisations - Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), Research Councils UK (RCUK), Universities UK (UUK) and Wellcome Trust - have launched a concordat that proposes a series of clear and practical principles for working with research data.
The Concordat on Open Research Data has been developed by a UK multi-stakeholder group - Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), RCUK, Newcastle University, UUK, HEFCE, University of Warwick, Research Information Network, Springer Nature, British Library, Wellcome Trust, University of Essex, The Russell Group and Jisc - and is a set of expectations of best practice reflecting the needs of the research community.
This concordat will help to ensure that research data gathered and generated by members of the UK research community is made openly available for use by others wherever possible; in a manner consistent with relevant legal, ethical, disciplinary and regulatory frameworks and norms, and with due regard to the costs involved.
The ten principles include importance of developing data skills; importance of ensuring data underlying publications is accessible by publication date; rights of data creators to reasonable first use; and expectations of data users to acknowledge use of others' data.
While there are four initial signatories to the concordat, there has been wider consultation with the research community and their feedback and input helped shape the final text. The Concordat on Open Research Data is open for other organisations and groups to sign up to over time.
Open research data is the next step in achieving the UK’s open science ambitions and is expected to help improve cooperation and strengthen the UK's position as a global science leader.
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