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2004 CONSERVATION BIOLOGY EDITOR'S REPORT

Gary K. Meffe, Editor

Overview

In 2003 six issues of Conservation Biology were published on time. The number of manuscripts submitted to the journal in 2003 increased from the previous year by 7.0%. A total of 1884 pages was published, an increase of 11.5% from 2002 and the second-largest volume in our history. Two Special Sections were published in 2003 (Population Biology of Invasive Species and Human-Carnivore Conflict: Local Solutions with Global Applications), totaling 128 pages. Conservation Biology continued to receive excellent national and international press coverage due to our media consultant, Robin Meadows, who provides news tips to the media of selected articles. Finally, the Editorial office provided information upon request to the review team conducting the first-ever review of the journal. We look forward to incorporating recommendations from the review that were received at the 2004 annual meeting.

Major Developments in 2003

Several major developments regarding the journal occurred in 2003.

1. The largest and most exciting development was the announcement in the December issue of a new electronic submittal option. This was in response to a call from the membership and the Board of Governors for the option to transmit manuscripts electronically, and is a historic change in how the journal conducts its business. It required several months of preparation, technological adjustments, and practice with mock submittals by the staff of the Editorial Office to be able to handle the challenges of this new procedure. It also required establishing new protocols for and training of Editorial Board members. This was all accomplished in the second half of 2003 in anticipation of the December announcement.

As of June 2004, an estimated 95% of manuscript submittals were electronic, indicating that indeed this is something appreciated and embraced by authors. The Editorial Office and Editorial Board handled the transition very well, though not without some bumps in the road. There were technological difficulties at the outset and the learning curve was steep (virtually every aspect of office life was affected), but the process generally has worked smoothly. Whether it effectively speeds the review and publication process remains to be seen, as the largest time bottlenecks continue to be due to human behavior and not physical transport of manuscripts. Assigning Editors and reviewers make or break the process, as do authors during revision. We continue to push for faster reviews and eliminate from the Board those individuals who are persistently slow; three Board members were removed in 2003 for this reason. We also ask authors to provide revisions within tight time limits.

2. In response to the Society's strong push toward internationalization, the journal made several major strides in 2003. First, I sent a letter in May 2003 to all Section presidents with important information about the journal relative to internationalization. This included a clear statement of the journal's intent to be more international, clarification of journal policies about acceptable papers, an open invitation for Editorials and Special Sections to be developed from outside the United States, and a strong encouragement for international scientists to submit their papers to Conservation Biology. I also asked each Section to suggest appropriate individuals from outside the United States to be considered for service on the Editorial Board. The presidents were encouraged to share that letter with their full membership in whatever form they desired.

Second, I wrote an Editorial in the October issue that addressed internationalization of the journal and repeated many of the issues that were covered in the letter to Section presidents. This Editorial also encouraged more submittals from outside the United States.

Third, after an extensive consideration of nominees, I appointed eight new Board members in 2003 from Australia, Hong Kong, Mexico, Singapore, Spain, South Africa, and Sweden (2), to add to the existing 10 non-U.S. members. Thus far in 2004 I have added two more individuals from England and Wales to the Board of Editors, and am continually looking for further opportunities in this area.

3. In the June 2003 issue, an important Editorial on conservation and the social sciences heralded one of the next pushes by the journal, the stronger integration of the social sciences into effective conservation. A great deal of interest has spun off that Editorial and the journal has received noticeably more papers in the social sciences in recent months.

4. At the strong urging of the publisher, we switched to offshore typesetting (by Techbooks, in India) starting with the December 2003 issue. This gives us faster turnaround times, significant cost savings, and better-quality files for online publication. Techbooks' e-proofing system is more sophisticated than was that of Capital City Press, which allows us, for example, to place offprint order and page charge forms on a Web site along with article proofs for the authors to access, rather than sending them as attachments to the authors in e-mails. Techbooks' e-proofing also sends automatic reminder e-mails to authors if they have not downloaded their proofs within a certain amount of time. Turnaround time for typesetting (from edited manuscript to page proofs) went from about 10 days to 5 days. There are also large cost savings with Techbooks. We are no longer charged for corrections (correction costs with our domestic typesetter were approaching 50% of the typesetting costs) or for electronic files for the Web. Typesetting costs went from approximately $35 per page to approximately $10 per page. All of this will be passed on as cost savings to SCB.

5. The impact factor for Conservation Biology in 2003 was the highest ever for this journal: 3.279 (2002 was at 2.663). We are ranked among all journals as follows for the following categories: ecology, 11th; biodiversity conservation, 3rd (behind only Global Change Biology and American Naturalist); and environmental sciences, 4th (behind Global Change Biology, Environmental Science and Technology, and Global Biogeochemical Cycles). By comparison, the journals with most similar content to Conservation Biology are ranked as follows among all ecological journals: Ecological Applications, 18th (2.852); Conservation Ecology, 29th (2.101); Biological Conservation, 31st (2.056), Animal Conservation, 44th (1.481); Oryx, 52nd (1.253); Biodiversity Conservation, 60th (1.060).

Submissions

The submission rate for this journal year (613) increased from 2002 (573), indicating continued and growing interest in publishing here. The trend in submittal rate is as follows:

We also received and processed 141 preliminary manuscript inquiries, an 11% decrease from the previous year's total of 159. Most of these consisted of an abstract and an inquiry as to its suitability for the journal. We try to respond to these within 1-2 days of receipt.

We used 58 ad hoc Assigning Editors this year, individuals who handled one or more manuscripts but are not on the Board. Ad hoc Editors were used when a manuscript did not fall within the expertise of existing Editors, when they had special expertise in the area, or if the appropriate Assigning Editor was particularly busy with other manuscripts. This system has worked very well and will continue to be employed. Ad hoc Editors are acknowledged in the December issue of each year and are an integral part of this journal; I thank them for their contributions.

Decisions and Rejection Rates

Of the 613 papers received in 2003, 202 (33%) were rejected by the Editor without review, usually within three days of submittal and usually due to inappropriateness of subject matter or low quality; 411 (67%) were sent for review, most through Assigning Editors and a few directly by the Editor.

Of the 411 manuscripts sent for review, 213 (51.8%) were rejected, 134 (32.6%) were accepted, and no decision had yet been reached on 64 (15.6%), which are still in review or in revision with authors. Of the total number of papers submitted (613), 409 (66.7%) were rejected (slightly less than last year's 72.4%), 134 were accepted (21.8 %, up from 16.8% last year), and no decision was yet reached on 64 (or 10.4%, nearly identical to 10.6% last year) as of 31 May 2004. Of the 549 papers for which decisions have been made, 415 (74.5%) were rejected. However, some of the "no decision" papers are being revised and are likely to be accepted, so the overall rejection rate will be lower than this, probably near 70%.

Turnaround Time

See last year's report for a discussion of how turnaround statistics are calculated (i.e., these are relative but not absolute times because they are right-truncated due to manuscripts still in process).

Mean turnaround time for manuscript review continues to fluctuate between 70 and 80 days; it was up slightly in 2003 by one day to 80 days. We continue to have a struggle with busy reviewers who do not complete the task in a reasonable amount of time (or never complete it), and we continue to replace Assigning Editors who are consistently slow. Time from acceptance to publication decreased from 236 days in 2002 to 215 days in 2003 (-8.9%). Total time from submission to publication decreased from 391 to 344 days (-12.0%), indicating greater efficiency in the overall process.

Region of Authorship

Region of authorship is determined by the address of the first author at the time the work was done, and only partially reflects sovereignty of contributions. International participation in authorship is actually higher than indicated by these statistics due to secondary authorships. Of the 134 papers submitted and accepted in 2003, the proportion that were first-authored by U.S. authors decreased from 67.7% in 2002 to 56.0% in 2003. Regional changes from 2002 to 2003 are Asia (0% to 5.3%), Africa (4.2% to 1.5%), Australia (7.3% to 6.0%), Canada (3.1% to 6.0%), Central / South America (4.2% to 4.1%), and Europe (13.5% to 21.1%). For the first three issues of 2004, 51.2% of papers are from the U.S. and 48.8% are non-U.S. papers (using the same criterion of first authorship). This indicates a positive trend toward greater representation of non-U.S. based authors.

Miscellaneous Information

Two final comments on journal business bear mentioning. First, the unsung heroes of a successful journal are the Editorial Board members. They perform their tasks voluntarily with little reward other than personal satisfaction and the knowledge that their scientific insights keep our standards high. The vast majority of Board members perform their jobs efficiently, and admirably.

Second, it is the strong opinion of this Editor that the logistic and support functions of the journal--the Editorial office, Blackwell Scientific, Techbooks, and Capital City Press--are working as smoothly and effectively as they ever have. In short, this is an extraordinary team that works very well together. Margaret Flagg and Ellen Main of the Editorial Office are doing superior work in every aspect. Even with the increased workloads of a huge publishing year and a major transition to a new electronic submittal system, they have performed exceptionally well and in good spirits under, at times, a great deal of stress.

Likewise, realignment and new personnel at Blackwell have been entirely to our advantage. Robert Harington, Vice President and Publisher, Science Journals, has taken an extraordinary interest in Conservation Biology and SCB, is always responsive to our needs, and is eager to innovate. A new position--Senior Editor, Science Journals--held by Marjorie Spencer likewise helps when questions or problems arise. Perhaps most importantly, Production Editor Rosemary Farmer is nothing short of exceptional in her abilities and dedication to this journal. We have fullest confidence in her capabilities and always know that she is diligently working on our behalf. In short, this is an excellent publication team that works together extremely well.

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