EIFL publishes new provision on Secondary Publication Rights
EIFL Draft Law on Copyright On May 27, 2025, EIFL launched an updated version of its Draft Law on Copyright, featuring a new provision on Secondary Publication Rights (SPRs) (more information about the process can be found here). The new provision reads as follows: This provision is part of the EIFL Draft Law on Copyright, a “practical guide to assist librarians, policy-makers and legislators when copyright laws are being updated.” The guide aims to support libraries and is continually updated considering recent policy and legislative developments and the impact of new technologies. Secondary Publication Rights According to Angelopoulos (2022, p.4), a Secondary Publication Right is a “right for the author of a scientific publication to make it available online for free following a given embargo period”. Countries such as Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and, more recently, Slovenia, already have provisions addressing SPRs in their legal frameworks. In Belgium, for example, even in cases where the author has assigned their rights to a publisher, if the research was publicly funded, the author can make the manuscript publicly available in open access after 12 months for the humanities and social sciences, and 6 months for other sciences (Belgium Code of Economic Law, Art. XI. 196 2 §). Secondary Publication Rights are also present in South Africa’s Copyright Amendment Bill, through the insertion of section 12D in Act 98 of 1978, as follows: SPRs are also closely linked to open access policy goals, as demonstrated by the Commission Recommendation 2018/790 on access to and preservation of scientific information. This Recommendation states that Member States should implement policies and action plans related to open access and that, as a result, “whatever the channel of publication[…], open access to publications resulting from publicly funded research be granted as soon as possible, preferably at the time of publication, and in any case no later than six months after the date of publication (no later than 12 months for social sciences and humanities).” Footnotes:
