What are funders' requirements?
Public research funding organizations are placing an increasing emphasis on research data management policies and practices, both within Canada and internationally.
The Canadian Federal government has made a commitment to Open Science in its Open Government 2016-2018 plan, which outlines steps to make the science that supports policy decisions more transparent and accessible to the general public.
Increasingly, funding agencies are requiring that prospective recipients will submit a plan for managing research data and that data will be shared following the conclusion of a research project.
Canadian grant agencies' requirements
Current policies:
The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) requires that all "research data collected with the use of SSHRC funds must be preserved and made available for use by others within a reasonable period of time." SSHRC considers "a reasonable period" to be within two years of the completion of the research project for which the data was collected.
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research similarly requires the deposit of non-sensitive data within 12 months of publication.
Projects funded by Genome Canada must share data and resources in a "timely fashion" with no restrictions, with appropriate exceptions.
Simon Fraser University:
Simon Fraser University is committed to making accessible and preserving the products of research with the broadest possible community, including other scholars, practitioners, policymakers, and the public at large. To this end, research data will be managed in accordance with the principles outlined in SFU's Research Data Management Strategy.
International funding agencies' requirements
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
National Science Foundation (NSF)
Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research (MSFHR)
Horizon 2020 (Research funding in the European Commission)
The Wellcome Trust (UK)
Journal publishers' requirements
Instructions for authors or author guidelines often specify data sharing policies of each publication. Examples include Nature, Springer Nature, PLOS, and Wiley. These requirements typically include publishing all supporting datasets openly without restrictions when the article is published. A growing number of journal policies related to data and open science are being evaluated along specific Transparency and Openness Promotion (TOP) Guidelines created by the Center for Open Science.