In December 2005, the VLIZ-library launched the Open Marine Archive OMA. The purpose was to give immediate and complete access to all the published results of Flemish researchers. The immediate success of this initiative was largely due to the active support of the marine research community itself. Each Flemish/Belgian marine scientist was and is invited to contribute to this digital marine archive and to post his own publications on the OMA website. Today, already more than 3300 titles can be read and downloaded from www.vliz.be/oma.The IMIS-database behind the OMA archive has been adapted to the requirements of the OAI-PMH protocols (Open Archives Initiatives - Protocol for Metadata Harvesting). Specialized search engines, such as Google Scholar, and harvesters like the AVANO harvester developed by IFREMER, can now retrieve the specific marine metadata fromOMA and display the Flemish literature records at the top of their results lists. The links provided in these search results lead the user directly to the full text paper on the VLIZ servers.Further developments for OMA will be the direct linking of Flemish marine records from the ASFA-database (Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts) to the OMA-record, and the retrospective completion of literature cv’s of all Flemish marine researchers.