Standardising Funder Identifiers to ROR
As the research community prioritises open infrastructures, persistent identifiers (PIDs) are key in connecting research outputs, funders, institutions, and researchers. One significant recent step in this journey is transitioning and standardising Crossref Open Funder Registry funder data to Research Organisation Registry (ROR) IDs. ROR is an open, community-driven identifier system designed specifically for research organisations. ROR is much like ORCID for people or DOI for items or grants. ROR is already extensively used to identify organisations. However, along with Research Activity Identifiers (RAIDs), it is still considered one of the newer identifiers (5).
In an Irish context, the Irish National PID Strategy (5) highlights the importance of using ROR. ROR IDs are highlighted as a key component in the National Action Plan for Open Research (8), which aims to enhance interoperability and transparency in the research ecosystem. The strategy recommends the adoption of ROR IDs to uniquely identify organisations by focusing on Research Performing Organisations (RPOs). It does not explicitly call for ROR for Research Funding Organisations (RFO), but I expect this layer will be added as the Irish national PID roadmap is implemented. For reference, the PID strategy calls for the adoption of five priority PIDs: 1) DOIs for funding grants, 2) DOIs for outputs (e.g. publications, datasets, etc), 3) ORCIDs for people, 4) RAiDs for projects, and 5) ROR for RPOs (5).
Quote from the Irish National PID Strategy press release (4, 5):
This analysis shows that the cost of investing in a central support service, and of implementing PIDs in 25 publicly-funded, research-performing Irish institutions, would be more than outweighed by the time and cost savings generated by metadata re-use. The estimated efficiency gain is equivalent to more than 4,000 days of staff time savings each year, or nearly €1.8M in staff salary and overhead (4).
Multiple funder identification systems exist, and this non-standard nature is part of the problem of identifying funders in the system. ROR offers several advantages over alternatives that stem from its openness, interoperability, persistence, and alignment with broader research infrastructures. ROR is fully open, community-governed, and non-commercial, ensuring long-term sustainability and independence. In contrast, other funder ID systems are typically managed by an organisation, either open or proprietary. The main advantage of ROR is its open governance approach, which ensures that it remains a transparent, stable, and community-driven identifier system, reducing reliance on commercial infrastructures and influences.
This aim to standardise across the research system takes effort and has substantial implications for research libraries, repositories, and institutional systems, ensuring that funding data remains accessible, interoperable, and linked across scholarly communications infrastructure.
Transition to ROR to Strengthening Open Metadata
With Crossref’s announcement to phase out support for the Open Funder Registry in favour of ROR (2), the research community must take proactive steps to integrate ROR IDs into their workflows. This transition supports affiliation and funder use cases, ensuring institutional and funding data connect consistently and openly.
Crossref is specifically working on:
- metadata schema updates to evolve its metadata schema to support ROR for funders, ensuring that funding information in research outputs can be consistently linked and retrieved.
- mapping Funder IDs to ROR IDs to ensure comprehensive mapping between legacy Funder IDs and ROR IDs, providing continuity for existing records while facilitating the transition to a more robust system.
- developing text matching strategies with the understanding that funder data is often entered as free text, new strategies are being developed to reliably match textual funder acknowledgements to ROR IDs, strengthening metadata accuracy.
For repositories, institutional research systems, and funders, adopting ROR now will ensure a smooth transition and improve the discoverability and tracking of research outputs.
Why Repositories and Research Systems Should Act Now
- updating metadata practices to use ROR IDs in funding metadata within repositories, grant management systems, and CRIS systems
- engage with service providers and suppliers to support ROR integration in open repositories, CRIS systems, and related platforms.
Potential Next Steps for the Community
- Provide feedback on schema updates and mapping strategies. Feedback on schema updates and mapping strategies is essential for ensuring ROR IDs integrate effectively into research workflows. This can be done by reviewing proposed metadata changes, testing schema updates through sample XML submissions, and participating in pilot projects. Crossref and ROR have open documentation where users can comment on planned updates. Additionally, RPOs and RFOs can evaluate how well automated mappings between legacy Funder IDs and ROR IDs work, providing insights to improve accuracy.
- Participate in community discussions and working groups by joining community discussions and working groups allows stakeholders to shape the implementation of ROR in funding and affiliation metadata. Organisations such as Crossref, ROR, ORCID, and funder networks regularly host webinars, workshops, and advisory groups where participants can discuss best practices and raise concerns. Engaging in these conversations ensures that repository managers, funders, and institutions can align their needs with the broader research infrastructure.
- Advocating for funder and institutional adoption of ROR in research workflows by encouraging funders and institutions to adopt ROR in research workflows helps standardise metadata practices across the scholarly ecosystem. Institutions can integrate ROR IDs into grant application and reporting systems, repository deposit workflows, and researcher profiles. Funders can require their submission systems to include ROR identifiers for affiliations and funding records. Advocacy efforts include presenting at conferences, engaging with policymakers, thought leadership, and working with system suppliers to support ROR adoption in research information management tools.
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