The EOSC Track project has officially submitted its feedback to the European Commission’s Call for Evidence on the upcoming ERA Act, a legislative initiative that aims to strengthen research and innovation investment, reduce fragmentation, and enhance the EU’s global competitiveness. In our submission, we welcome the Commission’s ambition to consolidate the European Research Area (ERA), and we take this opportunity to stress a key message: Open Science is fundamental to a competitive, inclusive, and knowledge-based Europe. It should not be seen as a side pillar of ERA, it must be embedded at its very core.

Open Science is no longer a novelty; it is an operational necessity. It enables transparency, accelerates discovery, and broadens participation in research and innovation across borders and sectors. From reproducibility in science to equitable access to knowledge, Open Science fosters the conditions for a truly integrated ERA. But for these benefits to materialise, political vision must be matched with practical mechanisms. And one thing is clear: we cannot manage what we do not monitor.

In our feedback, we argue that the ERA Act presents a timely opportunity to improve the monitoring of Open Science. We call for:

• A dedicated set of Open Science indicators to be included in the ERA governance framework.

• Indicators that capture the full ecosystem - from policies and infrastructures to skills and impact.

• Co-creation of these indicators with national stakeholders to reflect national realities while enabling EU-level alignment.

Such indicators are not bureaucratic tools; they are essential for evidence-based policymaking, for benchmarking, and for fostering mutual learning between countries. They also build public trust by demonstrating openness, transparency, and accountability in research.

Our position is based on practical experience. Through the EOSC Steering Board Monitoring framework and Survey on National Contributions to EOSC and Open Science, and the development of an integrated monitoring tool - the EOSC Open Science Observatory, we are already helping map national progress. These efforts are reflected in the early lessons captured in our latest policy brief, which we submitted alongside our feedback. Our work demonstrates that monitoring can be done, and that countries are willing to contribute, especially when the tools are co-developed, validated, and presented in user-friendly, transparent ways.

A robust Open Science monitoring mechanism would not only support ERA priorities, it would also reinforce the EU’s commitment to digital sovereignty, research security, and scientific freedom.

The EOSC Track project stands ready to contribute. Our tools, such as the EOSC Open Science Observatory, are designed to support policymakers with reliable, validated, and actionable insights on the state of Open Science across Europe.

We invite you to read our latest policy brief, which outlines the lessons learned in building a joint monitoring capacity for Open Science in the ERA:

Stay tuned for more!