On February 18th, 2009, The National Research Council of Canada (NRC) announced the results of a strategic review of NRC programs conducted by the Federal Government of Canada. As a result of this review, the Government of Canada and the National Research Council of Canada have decided that the journals and services of NRC Research Press will be transferred to the private sector.
Over the next year, a new not-for-profit corporation will be created for the NRC Research Press journals and services. The National Research Council of Canada and senior management of NRC Research Press are working to ensure that this new entity will continue to provide a viable Canadian option for publishing Canadian and international research, support our Canadian scientific societies and develop new scholarly publishing practices and technologies. Therefore, the mission and objectives of this new corporate entity will remain largely the same as before.
NRC Research Press has operated as a cost-recovery program within the National Research Council. As such, this transformation is not the development of a "new business" but the movement of a successful program into a new legal and business environment. It is our belief that this new environment will afford us more flexibility to manage our publishing activities.
For all our subscribers, we would like to assure you that we are an ongoing Canadian scholarly publishing program delivering affordable, quality journals with great plans for the future.
Specifically for our Canadian clients and subscribers, since 2001 our journals have been provided electronically, free to all Canadians. This has been available due to the generous support of the Federal Depository Services Program. This availability will continue to be in place for the calendar subscription year 2009.
However, the Depository Services Program is not mandated to provide funding for publishing operations outside of the Federal Government of Canada. As the exact date of the transfer of NRC Research Press to a new legal entity in 2010 is still in question, we are unable at this time to inform you of the termination date of the free electronic access. We are attempting to persuade the Depository Services Program to provide this access through the remainder of calendar subscription year 2010. We will keep you informed as soon as we know the situation for 2010. It can be assumed that the support for free electronic access will cease for the calendar subscription year 2011.
NRC Research Press would like to thank the Depository Services Program for the funding they have provided over the last 8 years. It has been of great benefit to all Canadians.
The NRC Research Press will be posting progress reports of this transformation on our homepage website (http://pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/eng/home.html). If you have any further questions, please email us at pubs@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca
Cameron Macdonald
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