Dr Lidia Brito, UNESCO Regional Director for Southern Africa, launched the UNESCO Open Science Toolkit at the Open Science Day (7 December) that took place on the margins of the World Science Forum 2022 in Cape Town, South Africa. 

The Toolkit is a collection of resources (guides, policy briefs, factsheets and indexes) designed to support implementation of the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science. It is a living document, and will be updated to reflect new developments in open science and the status of implementation of the Recommendation.

Iryna Kuchma, EIFL Open Access Programme Manager, participated in five working groups that developed the Toolkit. In addition, EIFL specifically contributed to two Checklists in the Toolkit, in collaboration with partners: the Checklist for universities on implementing the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science, in collaboration with LIBSENSE (in English and in French), and the Checklist for open access publishers on implementing the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science, in collaboration with OASPA (Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association) (in English and in French). 

Use these resources!

We encourage everyone who is involved in open science work to use the Checklists mentioned above, as well as the following resources from the Toolkit -

• Bolstering open science infrastructures for all / Renforcer les infrastructures de la science ouverte pour tous
• Building capacity for open science / Renforcer les capacités au service de la science ouverte
• Developing policies for open science / Élaborer des politiques au service de la science ouverte
• Funding open science / Financer la science ouverte
• Identifying predatory academic journals and conferences / Reconnaître les revues et conférences scientifiques prédatrices
• Understanding open science / Comprendre ce qu’est la science ouverte