A Workshop on Institutional Repositories and Open Access was held in Maputo, Mozambique, in July from 28 to 30, 2008. 30 participants from higher education and research institutions from Maputo, the capital city and also from Beira and Nampula attended the workshop. On the July 30th an open session was organized about Open Access and a broader audience attended this event.

The workshop was facilitated by Eloy Rodrigues, director of Documentation Services in Minho University, Portugal, which one of the champions of Open Access in Portugal.

Topics covered during the workshop included the origins, scope and definitions of Open Access; the two roads for Open Access, journals and repositories; creation and development of institutional repositories and experience gained working with the repository of the of Minho University, Portugal.

Presentations from the workshop in Portuguese are here: http://www.eifl.net/cps/workspaces/eifl-oa/training-capacity/about-open-access

In terms of financing, this was a joint activity, involving eIFL.net, which supported the travel expenses of the facilitator, Universidade Politécnica in Mozambique, which covered the accommodation expenses for the facilitator and also provided the venue for the workshop and Eduardo Mondlane University/ Documentation Services Directorate, which covered the perdiem costs.

The major outcome of this workshop was the intention of building a joint repository for Mozambique, gathering the intellectual production of the academic and research staff in the country. This repository will be funded by the Ministry of Education and Culture and, at the start will be covering three institutions. It’s hoped that, in the future, more institutions will join the project. The technical support will be assured by the University of Minho.

Aissa Mitha Issak, eIFL country coordinator in Mozambique