Barcelona Declaration on Open Research Information

Bologna Meeting on Open Research Information


The Bologna Meeting on Open Research Information took place on May 28th, 2025 at the University of Bologna, Italy in the context of the 5th Workshop on Open Citations and Open Scholarly Metadata (WOOC2025).


Aims of the Meeting

In May 2025, nearly 200 participants from 35 countries, including signatories, supporters, and other interested participants of the Barcelona Declaration, gathered both online and in the room at the University of Bologna, Italy. The meeting was an opportunity to reflect on progress and share concrete steps being taken to implement the road map developed at the Paris Conference on Open Research Information in September 2024.

Through interactive sessions and breakout discussions, signatories, supporters, and other interested participants engaged with the ongoing work of the Declaration. The program featured presentations from institutions already putting the Declaration into practice: funders, universities, and infrastructure providers, illustrating its broad relevance and adaptability. The Barcelona Declaration working groups also hosted collaborative workshops, offering a transparent view into current priorities and inviting feedback from the wider community. By opening up the “kitchen” of the Barcelona Declaration, the meeting reinforced its commitment to collective progress through openness and dialogue.

The meeting report describing plans and activities of the Barcelona Declaration’s working groups is now available on Zenodo.


Meeting outcomes

Implementation journeys

Representatives from Fundación “la Caixa”, California Digital Library, and the Dutch signatories of the Barcelona Declaration shared how their institutions are putting the Declaration into practice; offering insights on aligning strategies, driving internal change, and fostering national-level collaboration.

A video of their presentations will soon be available on the newly launched Barcelona Declaration YouTube channel.


Working Group Breakout sessions

The Barcelona Declaration working groups held interactive breakout sessions to present their plans and activities, gather feedback, and identify priorities.

This section presents short summaries of the topics discussed in the working group breakout sessions. The outcomes of these discussions are captured in the Report of the Bologna Meeting on Open Research Information.


  • Working group 1 - Journal article and book metadata
    Developing a shared framework for essential metadata, supporting negotiations with publishers, and addressing the needs of under-resourced publishers—while considering regional diversity in publishing practices.

  • Working group 2 - Research outputs in repositories
    Improving metadata quality in institutional, preprint, and data repositories through workflow optimization, bringing together machine-learning approaches, and early plans for linked research object guidelines.

  • Working group 3 - Funding metadata
    Enhancing availability and usability of funding metadata via workshops with publishers and practical guidance for funders on adopting grant identifiers.

  • Working group 4 - Replacing closed systems
    Exploring institutional transitions from proprietary to open research information systems through surveys, focus groups, case studies, and training initiatives.

  • Working group 5 - Sustaining infrastructures
    Identifying funding strategies and shared sustainability principles to support open research infrastructures, building on existing global efforts.

  • Working group 6 - Evaluating open research information sources
    Defining evaluation criteria and developing tools to help institutions assess and adopt trustworthy, open research information sources.

  • Working group 7 - Evidence of benefits
    Collecting case studies and mapping stakeholders to highlight the practical value of open research information for institutions and researchers alike.

The Report on the Bologna Meeting on Open Research Information captures key outcomes of the meeting, highlights progress, priorities, and next steps across the Barcelona Declaration’s working groups is available on Zenodo.


Get involved!

Interested in contributing to the Barcelona Declaration? Join our growing community by:

  • Participating in a working group

  • Sharing your institutional use case or implementation story

  • Helping us identify regionally relevant strategies and underrepresented needs

Contact us at contact@barcelona-declaration.org to learn more.


Conference materials