Policy paper

FCDO open access policy

Published 8 December 2025

Introduction

This Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) open access policy  updates and replaces the Research Open and Enhanced Access Policy 2013 (published under the Department for International Development, DFID).

This policy is mandatory for all organisations, institutes, and partners who receive FCDO research funding including part, joint and co-funding. In the case of part, joint and co funding FCDO’s Open Access Policy will apply where it provides the majority of donor funding.

This policy is effective for:

• all new research grants, agreements, or contracts awarded on or after the 8 December 2025
• existing FCDO research grants, agreements, or contracts scheduled to end on or after 1 January 2028

Under this criterion FCDO expects that existing research grants, agreements, or contracts, will be notified by FCDO within 6 months of its publication date and transition to this policy within 1 year from its publication date. 

Existing research grants, agreements, or contracts will be exempt from implementing the technical requirements of the policy (see Annex 1: Technical requirements). Although, implementing all or some of the technical requirements listed in this policy is encouraged.

FCDO recommends that cost extensions or amendments to existing agreements, grants, and contracts on 8 December 2025 consider transitioning to this updated policy, although it is not mandatory to do so.

Policy aims

The aim of this policy is to maximise the impact of our research funding,^{[footnote 1]} and ensure it is accessible and shared in ways that enable others to build upon and use the knowledge and innovation generated.

Policy principles

This policy embraces the following principles:

1. FCDO funded written research outputs, intended for external publication, should be freely available, with unrestricted use and re-use of their content with appropriate attribution. They should be freely discoverable and preserved online for future use.

2. FCDO pays reasonable and proportionate open access costs for the external publication of written research outputs.

3. FCDO recognises the importance of diverse written research outputs beyond peer-reviewed publications.

Policy scope

This policy applies to the following written research publications and outputs: journal articles, preprints, books and book chapters and specified research reports and other written research outputs. It includes English and foreign language in-scope outputs and publications.

For clarity, out of scope of this policy are:

• all externally facing digital research technologies, tools, activities and resources. Please refer to FCDO’s Guidance on digital spend advice and controls for partners and suppliers   
• all evaluations and research and analyses outputs outlined as in-scope of  FCDO’s Evaluation Policy and the Government Social Research: Publication Protocol

Journal articles

Includes all original peer-reviewed research journal articles resulting from FCDO funding as well as, conference proceedings and conference papers which are accepted for publication in a journal.

All in-scope journal articles must be available immediately upon publication, without embargo in a journal, repository or publishing platform which is free to use and meets the technical standards listed under Annex 1: Technical requirements.

Licensing

In-scope research journal articles must be published under a Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY). 

If the grant, agreement or contract is subject to Crown Copyright then in-scope journal articles must be published under an Open Government Licence (OGL).

FCDO may permit, on a case-by-case basis, the use of a more restrictive Creative Commons Attribution No-derivatives licence (CC BY-ND). The FCDO must be contacted and agree an exception to publish a journal article under a CC BY-ND licence (prior to its publication). The FCDO will review exception requests and consider their context within the overall research work or programme (including any ethical, security, policy or political sensitivities). 

Submissions to subscription journals must include the following text in the funding acknowledgement section of the manuscript and any cover letter or note accompanying the submission:

For the purpose of open access, the author has applied [a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence] [an ‘Open Government Licence’] (or where permitted by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office) [a Creative Commons Attribution No-derivatives (CC BY-ND) licence] to any author accepted manuscript version arising.

These licensing requirements do not apply to any materials included within a research article that are provided by third-party copyright holders.

Publication routes

FCDO does not specify an open access publishing route for journal articles, as long as the route chosen meets the requirements (including technical) within this policy.

Data access statement

FCDO requires all in-scope research articles include a data access statement, even where no data is associated with the article, or the data are inaccessible. See Annex 2: Data access statements 

Preprints

FCDO encourages the posting of preprints. FCDO reserves the right to mandate the posting of preprints where rapid access to the research findings is likely to produce a significant public health, humanitarian, environmental or livelihood benefit.

Preprints should be made available under a Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY) or a Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike (CC BY-SA) licence and  should meet the technical standards listed under Annex 1: Technical requirements.

Books and book chapters

In-scope research outputs include books and book chapters which are primary or original outputs (rather than a consolidation, compilation, or collection of outputs available elsewhere). 

Final versions of books and book chapters must be free to view and download on the relevant publishers’ website or platform, institutional or subject repository or online publication platform.

Embargo periods on books and book chapters should not exceed 12 months.

FCDO approval

Books, and book chapters (including if FCDO funding is used for co-author) require prior written agreement from FCDO that they are core outputs and value for money.

Licensing

All in-scope books and book chapters must be published under a Creative Commons licence which permits re-use, subject to proper attribution. A CC BY licence is preferred.

If the grant, agreement, or contract is subject to Crown Copyright books or book chapters must be published under an Open Government Licence (OGL).

The relevant Creative Commons (CC) or Open Government Licence must be clearly displayed on the book or book chapter.

These licensing requirements do not apply to any materials included within a book or book chapter that are provided by third-party copyright holders.

Exemptions

If the chosen book or book chapter publisher does not provide open access publishing options, the FCDO should be notified and an exemption to the policy approved.
When seeking an exemption the following information should be confirmed:

• the chosen publisher does not have open access options available
• the chosen publisher is the best or only option available
• a request was made to the chosen publisher for the right to make the book, or book chapter open access

Research reports and other written research outputs

In-scope written research reports and other funded research outputs are specified below: 

• briefings or policy briefs
• case studies
• conference proceedings and papers (which are not accepted for publication in a journal)
• country or geographical research reports or summaries
• discussion papers
• helpdesk reports
• lessons learned
• technical and thematic research reports or summaries
• user or reference manuals, guidebooks, handbooks, field guides
• training materials and toolkits
• topic guides
• working papers

All in-scope research reports and other written research outputs specified in the above list must be available immediately upon publication without any embargo period.

Researchers must deposit the listed reports and written research outputs in a database, repository or publishing platform of their choice which meets the technical standards listed under Annex 1: Technical requirements.  In addition, researchers can upload in-scope reports and written research outputs to other platforms and websites including their programme, partner, institutions, or organisation website (if they exist).

Licensing

All in-scope reports and written research outputs must be published under the Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY). If the grant, agreement or contract is subject to Crown Copyright in-scope reports and written research outputs must be published under an Open Government Licence (OGL).

The relevant Creative Commons (CC) or Open Government Licence must be clearly displayed on the in-scope reports and written research outputs.

These licensing requirements do not apply to any materials included within the research reports and other in-scope research outputs that are provided by third-party copyright holders.

Statement of any quality review

A statement of any in house review of the quality, undertaken by the partner, institution or organisation, should be clearly stated on in-scope research reports and other written research outputs.

Data access statement

FCDO requires all in-scope research reports and other written research outputs include a data access statement, even where no data is associated with the research report or output, or the data are inaccessible. See Annex 2: Data access statements

Acknowledgement of UK funding required

All research publications and outputs, in-scope of this policy, must explicitly acknowledge UK government funding as specified below. All acknowledgements must include the programme or work title and funding number to facilitate FCDO compliance monitoring. The title of the work or programme must be written in full without acronyms.

R&D UK International Development funding acknowledgement

This material has been funded by UK International Development from the UK government; however, the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the UK government’s official policies.
[Programme/Work Title and Funding Number]

R&D funding acknowledgement

This material has been funded by the UK government; however, the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the UK government’s official policies.
[Programme/Work Title and Funding Number]

Funding for open access

FCDO considers the costs associated with supporting open access are a legitimate research expense if:

• costs for open access are proportionate, reasonable and represent value for money.
• existing arrangements and resources at the host institution are used first, where available and appropriate, to avoid paying twice for services

Recipients of our funding are responsible for the payment of any open access fees and costs within their overall research budget allocations.

Compliance and monitoring

FCDO will monitor compliance with this policy to assess its effectiveness in achieving the open access policy aims. 

All FCDO research programme agreements, grants and contracts undergo assessments of their progress and performance at regular intervals and require mandatory Annual Reviews. As part of the Annual Review process recipients of our funding must:

• confirm, in writing to FCDO, that they are publishing in compliance with FCDO’s mandatory open access policy
• provide an Output and Publications List (see Annex 3 for further details)

Research agreements, which are not part of an FCDO programme management cycle and produce outputs in scope of this policy, should confirm compliance with this policy and submit an Output and Publications List (see Annex 3 for further details) at agreed or stated milestones.

To assist monitoring of compliance with this policy, FCDO may also use online monitoring tools, and formal independent evaluations (or reviews) of its research programmes (which are commissioned by FCDO).

Annex 1: Technical requirements

The technical requirements for in-scope outputs and publications are listed below. FCDO recognises that it may be necessary to phase in some of the technical requirements outlined.

Journal articles

Technical requirements for journals and publishing platforms

Persistent Identifiers (PIDs)

• Persistent identifiers (PIDs) for articles are implemented in accordance with international recognised standards such as, Digital Object Identifiers (DOI), Uniform Resource Name (URN) or Handle

• FCDO strongly encourages journals to support common unique PIDs for research management information (for example identifiers for funders and /or organisations)
• ORCID, the researcher identifier, is supported to identify all authors and contributors

Metadata

• article level metadata is available, if possible, via a Creative Commons public domain dedication (CC0).
• the metadata standard adheres to international best practice such as Crossref schema and OpenAIRE guidelines
• machine-readable information on the open access status and the licence is embedded in the article metadata in a standard non-proprietary format

Preservation

• long-term preservation is supported via a robust preservation programme such as CLOCKSS, Portico or an equivalent

Citations

• openly accessible data on citations is made available according to the standards set out by the Initiative for Open Citations (I4OC).

Open Access Policies

• self-archiving policies are registered in the SHERPA RoMEO database

Technical standards for repositories (including institutional and subject)

Persistent Identifiers (PIDs)

• PIDs are implemented according to international recognised standards, for example DOI, URN or Handle

• FCDO strongly encourages repositories to support common unique PIDs for research management information (for example identifiers for funders and/or organisations).
• ORCID, the researcher identifier, is supported to identify all authors and contributors

Metadata

• article-level metadata is available, if possible, via a Creative Commons public domain dedication (CC0).
• article-level metadata includes the persistent identifier to both the Author’s Accepted Manuscript and the Version of Record
• the metadata standard adheres to international best practice such as the OpenAIRE guidelines
• machine-readable information on the open access status and the licence is embedded in the metadata in a standard non-proprietary format

Open Access Policies

• the repository is registered in the Directory of Open Access Repositories (OpenDOAR)

Preprints

Preprints are scientific manuscripts which have not been accepted by a journal publisher or been formally peer reviewed. They should be uploaded, by the authors, to a relevant preprint platform or service. They should have persistent identifiers and include relevant metadata (including the full title of FCDO work or programme and funding code).

Books and book chapters

FCDO encourages the adoption of metadata standards and persistent identifiers for books and book chapters, but they are not currently a requirement of this policy.

Research reports and other written research outputs

Research reports and other specified in-scope written research outputs must be published with persistent identifiers (PIDs) such as Digital Object Identifiers (DOI), Uniform Resource Name (URN) or Handle.

They should be uploaded to databases, publishing platforms, or repositories which:

• permit full text publication upload
• have machine readable and structured metadata, which as a minimum,  provides information on a publication’s title, author(s), publisher, publication year, publication format, size, subject or theme, keywords, and copyright
• have clear publication archiving or preservation policies or statements

Annex 2: Data access statements

A data access statement is required for in-scope journal articles and specified research reports and other written research outputs and publications.

FCDO does not currently have any requirements for the format of data access statements.  However, the data access statement should state where the research data supporting the results reported can be found and how it can be accessed. It should outline if there are any reasons to protect access to the data, for example, commercial confidentiality or sensitivities around data derived from potentially identifiable participants. Where applicable it should also include a hyperlink to the publicly archived dataset.

If there is no research data underpinning the work reported, then the data access statement should state this. 

Please contact the FCDO team if there is any difficulty complying with the data access statement requirement.

Annex 3: Output and publications list

To assist FCDO with monitoring and compliance outputs and publications lists must contain the following details (other information may be added if relevant or requested by FCDO). 

• title of publication: full title of publication (without acronyms)
• author(s): list all author(s) names
• full name of programme or work (as listed in the FCDO agreement, contract, or grant): programme name or work should be written in full, without any acronyms or abbreviations
• funding number: number of the FCDO agreement, contract or grant the output(s) or publications are funded under
• publication type: for example, journal article, preprint, book chapter, briefing, working paper or conference paper
• embargo period (books and book chapters only): confirm the embargo period (should not exceed 12 months)
• creative Commons CC BY licence: confirm licence or state licence the output was published under (see exemptions or exceptions below)
• link to publication: link should be the Persistent Identifier (PID) (except books and book chapters)
• name of platform or repository: confirm name and if relevant link to the repository or platform the in-scope publication is available on

In addition to the above, the following information should also be provided.

• exemptions – books and book chapters only: if an FCDO funded book or book chapter has not been published as open access, include the date the FCDO agreed the exemption
• exceptions – journal articles CC BY-ND only: if an FCDO article has been published under a CC BY-ND licence, include the date the FCDO approved  the exception

Annex 4: Glossary

APC: Article Processing Charge

CC: Creative Commons

CC BY:  Creative Commons Attribution licence

CC BY-ND: Creative Commons Attribution No-derivatives licence

CC BY-SA: Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike

CC0: Creative Commons ‘No rights reserved’ licence

DAS: Data access statement

DFID: Department for International Development

DOI: Digital Object Identifier

FCDO: Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office

I4OC: Initiative for Open Citations.

ISSN: International Standards Serial Number

LMIC: Low- and Middle-Income Countries

OA: Open Access

ODA: Official Development Assistance

OGL: Open Government Licence

PID: Persistent Identifier

R&D: Research and Development

URN: Uniform Resource Name

1. Research and Development (R&D) as defined in the OECD’s Frascati Manual. ↩