Open access but persistent divide: what are we missing of the challenges of African biomedical journal editors?

Africa is undoubtedly a major beneficiary of the open access movement; however, its contribution to open access remains extremely limited. In 2019, 196 out of 13,773 journals indexed in the DOAJ, were from Africa, down from 219 in 2011. The persistent North-South divide and the lack of representation of the big South in the open access conversation should be a cause for concern for the open access movement. Beyond the structural and environment challenges to research in Africa, the speaker will provide an overview of the challenges in developing a publishing industry in African including the views of the open access movement towards African journals. He will also discuss the need to reflect on the lack of geographical diversity in the open access movement, both in terms of content contribution and voices, and will explore how the open access movement could respond.