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There is growing recognition worldwide that our substantial global investments in research have much greater impact if they are widely shared and openly available to everyone. LA Referencia, OpenAIRE and COAR reaffirm their strong support for a shared vision of a global network of repositories as fundamental infrastructure for providing sustainable and open access to research outputs, ensuring that all researchers and citizens have access to the results of publicly funded research.

On November 25 and 26, 2015 representatives from LA Referencia, OpenAIRE and COAR met in Rio de Janeiro to discuss the adoption of common metadata guidelines for repository networks and identify areas for further collaboration. The meeting was hosted by the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), along with Ibict (Instituto Brasileiro de Informação em Ciência e Tecnologia), and is part of the Aligning Repository Networks work being lead by COAR.

OpenAIRE and LA Referencia represent two of the most advanced regional networks of open access repositories in the world. Closer collaboration between these two networks will enhance the usability and visibility of the collective content in the networks and enable the development of value added services across the two regions.

The three organizations therefore resolve to pursue their common vision through the following activities:

• LA Referencie and OpenAIRE will adopt common metadata practices, based on the current OpenAIRE guidelines and the vocabularies being developed in the context of COAR, for repository networks and develop these guidelines in collaboration.
  
  
• COAR, LA Referencia, and OpenAIRE will explore ways to build capacity for managing repositories and repository networks in Latin America, particularly in terms of the implementation of best practices.
  
  
• Under the auspices of COAR, LA Referencia, and OpenAIRE will continue to work with other national and regional networks to promote the vision of a global repository network and investigate common services in support of open access and open science.

LA Referencia is the network of open access repositories from eight Latin American countries. It supports national open access strategies in Latin America through shared standards and a single discovery platform. LA Referencia harvests scholarly articles and theses & dissertations from national nodes, which, in turn, harvest from repositories at universities and research institutions. This initiative is based on technical and organizational agreements between public science and technology organizations (National Ministries and Science & Technology Departments) with RedCLARA.

OpenAIRE, funded by the European Commission under H2020, is the Open Access Infrastructure for Research in Europe, based on the network of open access repositories.

The Confederation of Open Access Repositories (COAR) is an international association with over 100 members and partners from around the world representing libraries, universities, research institutions, government funders and others. COAR brings together the repository community and major repository networks in order build capacity, align policies and practices, and act as a global voice for the repository community.

Specific agreements:

• The national nodes of LA Referencia will adopt the OpenAIRE Guidelines and, through LA Referencia, participate in the development of the guidelines with OpenAIRE as they evolve in the future.
  
  
• LA Referencia will develop a strategy and launch communities of practice to facilitate sharing of expertise across participating countries and to support implementation of guidelines at local institutions.
  
  
• LA Referencia, OpenAIRE and COAR will partner to develop a blended learning course to build capacity in managing repositories in Latin America.
  
  
• LA Referencia and OpenAIRE will provide validators that will enable repositories to assess their level of compliance with the guidelines.

For more information about LA Referencia, please visit: http://lareferencia.redclara.net/rfr/