Last week, COMMUNIA joined IFLA, LIBER and SPARC Europe for a meeting with Ekaterina Zaharieva, Commissioner for Startups, Research and Innovation, to discuss the upcoming European Research Area (ERA) Act.
During this constructive exchange, we highlighted two priorities: an EU-wide secondary publication right to make publicly funded research openly available, and a general scientific research exception to create a harmonised copyright framework that enables researchers across Europe to use and build on copyright-protected research materials.
As we have argued since the beginning of this mandate, Europe must remove persistent barriers that prevent libraries and other knowledge institutions from fulfilling their public mission, particularly in the digital environment. The ERA Act offers an important opportunity to address these barriers and help turn the “Fifth Freedom”—the free movement of researchers, knowledge and technology across the EU—into a reality.
We thank Commissioner Zaharieva and her cabinet for welcoming us and engaging with our proposals. We look forward to the Commission’s proposal for the ERA Act and to continuing this dialogue as the legislation takes shape.
