(21 July 2016) Scientific publisher, CABI, has launched Open Books. This new programme supports authors and collaborating organisations wishing to publish open access books across a wide range of subject areas within applied life sciences and sustainable tourism.
As an international not-for-profit organisation, CABI aims to improve people’s lives worldwide by providing information and applying scientific expertise to solve problems in agriculture and the environment. The organisation believes that a crucial way to solve problems in these fields is by creating, managing, curating and disseminating information. With experience in scientific research, publishing, knowledge management and communications, CABI’s goal is to put scientific know-how into the hands of the people who need it most, and is helping to do this with open access books.
CABI’s Chief Information Officer, Andrea Powell, talks about using open access information to tackle global challenges like food security: “About 80% of the food we eat is grown by smallholder farmers in developing countries. But around 40% of what they grow is lost to crop pests. If we open up and share scientific agricultural information, and help farmers reduce this huge loss, we not only help protect their livelihoods but also safeguard global food security.”
CABI Open Books are freely available online at CAB eBooks upon publication and are accessible to anyone worldwide, ensuring distribution to the widest possible audience. They join other CABI products available under open access models such as the Invasive Species Compendium. The Open Book option is especially useful for organisations with a mandate to publish research under an Open Access agreement.
CABI is keen to increase the visibility and discoverability of authors’ works. All CABI Open Books will be submitted to the Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB). The books are also indexed, down to chapter level, in CABI’s world-renowned bibliographic database, CAB Abstracts, and (where relevant) Global Health. This helps bring them to a global audience of researchers, teachers and students. CABI uses a Creative Commons licence to facilitate widespread distribution and Open Books can also be made available in print using a simple cost-based pricing model.
Talking about the benefits of CABI Open Books, Prof. P. Wenzel Geissler, who works at the University of Oslo’s Institute of Social Anthropology, said: “Speaking personally, the opportunity to publish an Open Book is marvellous, because my proposed title – dealing with the ethics of research and economic inequality – can now reach a wide audience of people who would not normally be able to buy academic books. To reach a wide range of individuals and organisations through an easily accessible platform like Open Books is invaluable. It means we can reach NGOs, students and scientific researchers at the lowest possible threshold, helping them to address the ethical issues that arise from their political and economic context.”
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