The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) introduces a new requirement in project funding as it expects researchers to include a data management plan (DMP) in their applications as of October 2017. DMPs will also become mandatory in the next Ambizione, PRIMA and Sinergia calls. In particular, the SNSF expects that data generated by funded projects will be made publicly accessible in digital databases – provided there are no legal, ethical, copyright or other constraints.

This move by the SNSF is in line with policies put in place by other funding agencies, both public (European Research Council, US National Science Foundation) and private (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Wellcome Trust), as well as a series of journals (American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, American Journal of Political Science, etc.) that have also adopted open data policies.

Through this initiative, the SNSF encourages researchers to think about the lifecycle of their data at the outset of their project, including how to collect, process, store, archive and share data. Efficient data management is essential to preserve data’s long-term value, to the responsible and ethical conduct of research, and to improved publishing and reuse of research findings.

The reasons for the move toward open data policies by research funders are manifold: (1) over the last few decades, data-driven methods have become prevalent in many fields of scientific inquiry; (2) open data inscribes itself into the more general rationale of open access, which is to make research more transparent and accessible; (3) the need to ensure reproducibility, as the scientific community – especially in the hard sciences – has come under increased scrutiny after a series of frauds linked to data twisting and falsification.    

Open data is not unproblematic as scholars in the humanities, notably, see their terms of research dictated by the prevalence of scientific paradigms advocating the primacy of data over other forms of knowledge creation such as hermeneutics. Some researchers may, indeed, never use data in the strict sense. Concerns have also been raised that academics, in particular more junior ones, may see their data scooped in a highly competitive academic environment. Thus far, however, researchers are only expected to share data directly linked to SNSF-funded publications (instead of the entirety of data collected during the project). Finally, data sharing takes efforts and requires financial and human resources for proper implementation.

With regards to the new data management, the SNSF expects researchers to fill in a data management plan (DMP) on the mySNF application platform. The DMP is organised into four sections:  (1) data collection and documentation, (2) ethics, legal and security issues, (3) data storage and preservation, and (4) data sharing and reuse. The SNSF provides a template and detailed descriptions of what is required for each section.

Applicants also need to think about the repository in which they will make their data available. The SNSF proposes a database of repositories compliant with the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) principles on www.re3data.org but leaves the final choice to the researchers. To cover the costs of data upload, preparation and validation the SNSF allocates up CHF 10,000 per project.

The SNSF recognises that the best way for managing data varies by research field, that data means different things in different disciplines, and that some data cannot be shared because applicants are bound by legal, ethical, copyright, confidentiality or other clauses. In such cases researchers have to explain their specific constraints in the DMP.

Finally, the SNSF emphasises that its data management requirements are still in the making. In the words of Ayşim Yilmaz, responsible for open data at the SNSF: “It’s a learning process for everyone involved.” The SNSF has therefore conceived the DMP as flexible and evolutive as it remains editable during the entire lifetime of the grant and becomes final only at the end of the project. The initially submitted version of the DMP is not part of the evaluation but will be assessed by the SNSF administrative offices for its plausibility.

The Graduate Institute is currently in the process of drafting its own data policy and guidelines, which will be made available on its Research Support site. In the meanwhile we recommend applicants to closely follow the instructions on the SNFS website and directly in the applicant’s portal.

In case of questions please contact the Research Office or the SNSF directly.