FAQ: Collections Budget Changes

The cost of journal subscriptions, particularly for major publisher packages, has become unsustainable for universities across North America, with prices expanding beyond many libraries’ budgets.

At the same time, Canadian universities are working through broader budget challenges due to several factors, including pressure on international student enrollments and increased operating costs.

UBC Library’s collections budget is impacted by these two situations. Almost 40 per cent of UBC Library’s budget put toward academic serials goes to package agreements with five large publishers: Elsevier, Springer, Taylor & Francis, Wiley and Sage. With increased inflation and ongoing fluctuations in the USD/CAD exchange rate, it is especially important for us to look strategically at our spending, and plan for the sustainability of our collections budget into the future.

We need to employ a new approach to spending on serial subscriptions in order to sustain the diversity of our collections and avoid future deficits.

The cost of journal subscriptions has become unsustainable for universities across North America, with prices expanding beyond many libraries’ budgets.

There are a number of reasons for increased costs:

• Significant year-over-year inflation;
• Packages are priced in USD, and with the high USD/CAD exchange rate, the CAD cost is extremely high;
• Publishers have not updated pricing models to reflect the change from historical print costs to digital publishing;
• New titles absorbed into the larger packages are repriced at a much higher cost than their original subscription price.

There is a growing movement among academic institutions to rethink this subscription model, and in many cases, reset the relationship with for-profit publishers. In order to sustain the diversity of our collections, it is crucial that we join these institutions and adjust how we provide access to serial titles and online publishers moving forward.

No. Most of the online resources that UBC scholars use are paid for by the library through subscriptions and licenses. These resources are usually quite expensive. Many disciplines also still rely heavily on print material.

Our data allows us to measure the use of each publisher package and title within those packages. Among the five big serial packages that we subscribe to, the Sage package deal is the least used. It is also the serial package with the lowest rate of publications by UBC authors, year after year.

Beginning in 2023, UBC Library supported open access articles by UBC authors publishing in PLOS journals. The agreement with PLOS was an annual cost paid by UBC Library that ensured all UBC authors’ APCs were 100% waived. Prior to 2023 these APCs were covered by UBC authors’ research funds. 

We are in a different financial position than we were when that deal was made. Due to budget constraints, starting January 2026, UBC Library is no longer able to continue with an annual cost to cover UBC authors’ APCs for PLOS.

The UBC Library Strategic Framework instructs us to “Steward the organization,” which includes the need to “develop organizational agility to effectively respond to a changing environment” and “advance sustainable practices in our work.”

We are also committed to supporting Open Access as an alternative to for-profit publishing. The publishing industry’s profit margins are bolstered by the free labour of the scholarly community, who create and disseminate knowledge and give time as editors and peer reviewers. This scholarly work, produced for free, is then placed behind publisher paywalls, with the cost to access largely paid by academic libraries. This system is out of step with our values and our budget.

You can learn more about UBC’s Open Access Position Statement and cIRcle here.

We are committed to helping you access the materials you need. UBC Library purchased all of Sage’s backfiles, ensuring you have immediate access to all articles in Sage titles through 2025. New articles within Sage titles we no longer subscribe to will continue to be available through through open access (where applicable) and interlibrary loan, which often provides same-day access, or access within one to two days.

PLOS is an open-access science journal, and all titles will remain available.

Yes, this change applies to both campuses, as all Library users across UBC Vancouver and Okanagan access online serials through the same system.

We will not be renewing these agreements for 2026. The changes to Sage and PLOS go into effect on Dec. 31, 2025.

At this time, we are only ending our package deal with Sage and our agreement with PLOS.

We will continue to assess the sustainability of our collections budget strategy and plan for projected costs over the coming years. We are committed to sharing timely information regarding any changes.

UBC Library is mitigating budget challenges through a number of Collections strategies that support both UBC Vancouver and Okanagan campuses.

• E-purchasing: We continue to follow an e-first policy, providing e-resources where possible for the maximum convenience for students and researchers. An e-first policy is also financially responsible, allowing our collections budget to go farther.
• Collective negotiating: UBC Library is a member of several library consortia at both a provincial and national scale. These consortia of research libraries act as a collective to negotiate lower costs on serial subscriptions and favorable contract agreements. Approx. 71% of our budget put toward serial subscriptions is negotiated through these consortia. These consortia-negotiated agreements benefit us around a 20% cost reduction for the Library.
• Hedge rates: Each year, we work closely with the UBC Treasury to secure a foreign exchange hedge on USD purchases for that year, which means that we work with a fixed exchange rate, shielding us from market variability and allowing us to better plan our collections spending.
• Beyond our collections budget strategy, the library is also mitigating budget challenges by looking at branch hours and service models, including the recent relocation of the Education Collection to Koerner Library at UBCV, and assessing our IT licensing agreements.

Many leading research libraries across North America have already shifted their collections spending strategies away from the for-profit publisher packages toward a more sustainable approach. These institutions are facing similar decisions, and many have already moved to end large publisher package agreements.

For example, MIT, Université de Montréal, SUNY, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Florida State University, Max Planck Society and Temple University have all withdrawn from major publisher packages.

Before making this decision, we shared and discussed this information with a number of important groups, including University and academic senior leadership, Dean’s Councils on both campuses, and Senate Library Committee, as well as with our Library leadership and Collections Team.

UBC Library has formed a Title Retention Working Group made up of librarians from both campuses and diverse subject backgrounds who developed a model to identify highly used, high-impact titles for retention among the “all titles” agreement.

To determine this, the Title Retention Working Group explored four key areas through data collection and analysis:

1. Usage Patterns: What titles are being used by UBC Library patrons?
2. Institutional Demand: Where within UBC is that usage occurring?
3. Publishing Trends: Which titles are UBC authors publishing in?
4. Subject Relevance: How valuable are the titles within the package to their respective subject categories?

The group analyzed how these areas intersect to support the development of a data-informed title retention model.

Data sources include Citation Counts, APC Rates, Subject Fields and Rankings, UBC Usage Data, UBC Publishing Data, and UBC Authentication Data and Subject Specialty through OpenAthens system. The data range used for this analysis was from 2021 to 2024.

As of January 1, 2026, the following titles will remain accessible through the Sage platform: Sage Title Retention List.

Regarding articles currently in review, UBC Library has made arrangements with Sage and PLOS for APCs to continue to be covered for UBC authors, where possible. 

• For Sage, articles submitted before Dec. 31, 2025 to hybrid journals will have their APCs covered as per the original agreement. However, articles submitted to Sage’s Gold Open Access journals will not be eligible for the discount. 
• For PLOS, we have arranged a three-month extension to help support authors whose articles are still in review. This extension applies to articles submitted before our announcement of changes in September 2025. 

We understand the changes to APCs may have caused some confusion. Thank you for your patience, while we worked through negotiations.