Open science: an ANRS MIE priority

Open science refers to the unhindered dissemination of results, methods and products from scientific research.

Last updated on 24 September 2026

Opening up science!

Open science helps to democratise knowledge by making it more accessible and beneficial to everyone, thereby promoting more transparent and comprehensive scientific research.

It acts as a catalyst for scientific integrity and fosters public trust in science.

The Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Space is working, through its Committee for Open Science (CoSO), towards the coordinated implementation of an Open Science Strategy (OSS) via action plans.

The Open Science Strategy 2026-2033

The OSS 2026–2032, launched in September 2026 following two successive national plans (2018–2021 and 2021–2024), aims to consolidate and scale up the transformations already underway, drawing on a strategic approach and four-year action plans. It sets out the key ambitions for open science, which should enable:

  • greater scientific influence and autonomy
  • more cumulative and collaborative research,
  • more reproducible, responsible and sustainable research,
  • research that fosters innovation and reaches beyond the academic world.

The SSO’s first four-year action plan (2026–2029) is structured around eight strategic objectives:

  1. Encouraging a change in practices to make open science the default principle
  2. Consolidating the governance and instruments of open science policy
  3. Strengthening the ecosystem of open science services and infrastructures, the pillars of scientific sovereignty
  4. Strengthen France’s position within the European and international open science landscape
  5. Structure and support open, reliable and high-quality scientific publishing
  6. Consolidate the framework for openness and the sharing of research data in accordance with the FAIR principles (findable, accessible, interoperable, reusable)
  7. Strengthen the openness and promotion of source codes and research software
  8. Ensure the transparency of clinical trials

Transparency for greater scientific integrity

The two previous National Plans for Open Science (2018–2021 and 2021–2024) have led to significant progress:

  • The open-access publication rate rose from 38 % to 61 % for all publications, and from 40 % to 66 % for scientific articles.
  • Articles incorporating open science practices also saw an increase in citations of up to 19 %, thereby demonstrating the positive impact of open science on the visibility and recognition of French research.
  • The National Fund for Open Science was established; it has launched two calls for proposals to promote open scientific publishing and has supported key international initiatives.
  • The National Research Agency (ANR) and other funding agencies, such as ANRS MIE, now require open access to publications and the drafting of data management plans for the projects they fund.

Given the urgency of the current health crises, research into emerging infectious diseases cannot succeed without the sharing of knowledge and, therefore, open science. Since its inception, ANRS MIE has fostered this sharing of knowledge amongst researchers, policy-makers and civil society organisations. Transparency remains crucial to ensuring public confidence in research.

ANRS MIE, a founding member of the Open Science Network of French Funding Agencies

Since 2020, ANRS MIE has been contributing to the development of open science alongside its partners in the Network of French Funding Agencies (the ANR, ANSES, INCa, ADEME and the Foundation for Medical Research, which joined the network in 2024). As such, ANRS MIE raises awareness amongst and engages the researchers it funds on the key issues and best practices, with a view to:

  • Promoting open access to scientific publications;
  • Encouraging the openness of research data in accordance with the ‘as open as possible, as closed as necessary’ principle;
  • Share practices and methods for assessing the scientific quality of projects, in accordance with the recommendations of the San Francisco Declaration;
  • Inform and raise awareness amongst grant recipients by sharing best practice;
  • Make data relating to projects funded by each institution openly available, in line with the Open Government Partnership and in accordance with the Law for a Digital Republic;
  • Publish an annual report on the actions and various measures implemented in support of open science.

2026–2030 Action Plan of the Open Science Network of French Funding Agencies

In order to strengthen their joint policy for the coming years, the ANRS MIE and its partners in the Network are guided by a 2026–2030 action plan, in which they commit to prioritising seven actions linked to the new Open Science Strategy. Through this action plan, the network reaffirms its commitment to open science and continues its collaboration to make science a common good.

The commitments of ANRS MIE

We continue to pursue our actions in favour of open science

  • In 2023, we supported the Action Plan for Diamond Open Access. This plan promotes a publication model that enables researchers to disseminate their work in open access conditions with no publication fees and be able to read articles free of charge – its economic model being based on academic grants.
  • We have also helped to set up a working group as part of the Coalition on Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA), of which we have been a member since 2022. By taking part in the “Improving practices in the assessment of research proposals” working group, the Agency aims to help identify innovative approaches to project selection and assessor training. Alongside the opening up of publications, data and source codes, the research assessment reform is of great importance to open science.
  • Finally, at the end of 2023, we initiated a preliminary internal review regarding the access to, management and sharing of research data. One of the objectives could be to develop an institutional policy on the subject in 2024.

Updates to the Open Science section of our calls for proposals regulations and the creation of a collection in HAL

In 2024, we are changing the regulations for our calls for proposals, in which:

  • the full text of the scientific publications resulting from projects we fund shall be submitted to the HAL national open archive no later than the time of publication.
  • peer-reviewed scientific publications resulting from projects we fund shall be made available, under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) licence or equivalent, via one of the following routes: i. publication in a natively Open Access journal; ii. publication in a subscription journal under a transformative agreement or in a
  • transformative journal; iii. publication in a subscription journal with submission of the version of record or post-print in the HAL open archive under a CC-BY licence implementing the rights retention strategy.
  • eligibility for funding of publication fees or Article Processing Charges (APC) shall be displayed, with the exception of those concerning hybrid journals (subscription journals without any transformative agreement in progress).
  • encouragement shall be given to the submission of initial versions, pre-prints, to open platforms or archives and the use of permanent or unique identifiers (e.g. DOI, HAL Id or ORCID).
  • recommendation shall be made for the use of the “structured” data management plan model on the OPIDoR DMP portal.

We will enter the data relating to the research funded by our agency as part of our calls for proposals on the open public data platform data.gouv.fr. and create our own collection in HAL. One of the objectives of our agency is to facilitate the link between the funding we implement and the research that results from this.

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