Abstract:
Objective: This study sought to investigate the faculty’s awareness, attitudes and use of open access, and
the role of information professionals in supporting open access (OA) scholarly communication in Tanza-
nian health sciences universities.
Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16
librarians, whi le questionnaires were physically distributed to 415 faculty members in all eight Tanzanian
health sciences universities, with a response rate of 71.1%.
Results: The study found that most faculty members were aware about OA issues. However, the high level
of OA awareness among faculty members did not translate into actual dissemination of faculty’s research
outputs through OA web avenues. A small proportion of faculty’s research materials was made available
as OA. Faculty were more engaged with OA journal publishing than with self-archiving practices. Senior
faculty with proficient technical skills were more likely to use open access than junior faculty. Major bar-
riers to OA usage were related to ICT infrastructure, awareness , skills, author-pay model, and copyright
and plagiarism concerns. Interviews with librarians revealed that there was a strong support for promoting
OA issues on campus; howev er, this positive support with various open access-related tasks did not trans-
late into actual action. It is thus important for librarians and OA administrators to consider all these factors
for effective implementation of OA projects in research and academic institutions.
Conclusion: This is the first comprehensive and detailed study focusing on the health sciences faculty ’s and
librarians’ behaviours and perceptions of open access initiatives in Tanzania and reveals findings that are
useful for planning and implementing open access initiatives in other institutions with similar conditions.
