Research organisations and individual experts have now highlighted the critical need for access to the global library of research publications. Without such access, a country's economic strength is severely disadvantaged and the climb out of poverty is hampered. Surveys have shown that most of the world's libraries are unable to afford the cost of the academic journals they need and there exists an unequal environment in learning and research. This is a major barrier to development.

Now, means have been developed through the Budapest Open Access movement1 to remedy this situation. Simple, low cost archiving of the international published research through the establishment of interoperable institutional archives is now a possibility, opening the door to equal access. The process is already underway.

How will it be achieved: The cost of setting up interoperable archives is very low (space on a server and a week of systems operator time is all that is needed). The software is free. Set-up help is widely available. All can readily be configured to be interoperable. Authors can be shown how to archive their publications (' It takes just a few keystrokes…'). Archives showcase institutional research output.

Little else need change: This solution changes little in the current pattern of knowledge distribution. Authors continue to publish in their chosen journals. Publishers continue to sell their journals to those that can afford them. Referees operate as at present and quality is assured. Some 92% of journals agree to author-archiving in institutional repositories. Already, in physics, such an archive (known as arXive2) has operated in harmony with major physics journals for some 12 years with no loss in subscriptions. Research archived in this way has been shown to have far greater impact than research hidden behind cost barriers. As cost restrictions to access are eliminated, research from developing countries becomes part of the global library of knowledge.

OA Archiving is now accepted by major research organisations 3,4 and countries. The UK Science & Technology Committee, the US NIH, CERN, Max Planck institutes, all Netherlands Universities, Finland and many other countries and organisations have agreed/recommended OA Archiving policies. Developing country organisations and publishers are welcoming the movement that will at last provide equality of access and visibility for their research. The steady progress of adoption can be followed at the Open Access News forum5.

What must be done: We ask that WSIS recognises the great benefits to be gained by adopting and supporting the principle of Open Access Archiving. Now, international efforts are needed to 1) raise awareness, 2) to organise workshops for technology transfer, setting up archives and depositing published research papers. This minimal effort will have maximal benefits to all nations, however poorly endowed. The progress of science and economic growth will receive a major boost.

1. BOAI statement: http://www.soros.org/openaccess/
2. arXive: http://arxive.org
3. Berlin Declaration: http://www.zim.mpg.de/openaccess-berlin/berlindeclaration.html
4. Bethesda Statement: http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/bethesda.htm
5. OA News http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/fosblog.html

Note: OA Archiving should not be confused with OA Publishing, which is a complementary strategy. OA Archiving is a much faster and immediate route to the research information that is needed urgently in this fragile and widely information-starved planet.