Editorial 2023

The Global Biogeography Initiative

“…While open access publishing has certain merits, and ‘flipping’ subscription based or ‘hybrid’ journals to ‘gold’ OA appears imminent (Rieseberg et al, 2023), the associated Article Processing Charges (APCs) are beyond the means of many biogeographers in many nations, across low‐ to high‐income countries. Moreover, in the minority of cases that funds may be available, they present startling trade‐offs even for researchers from middle‐income economies.…”

“…Whileopenaccesspublishinghascertainmerits,and'flipping'subscription based or 'hybrid' journals to 'gold' OA appears imminent (Rieseberg et al, 2023), the associated Article Processing Charges (APCs)arebeyondthemeansofmanybiogeographersinmanynations, across low-to high-income countries. Moreover, in the minority of cases that funds may be available, they present startling trade-offsevenforresearchersfrommiddle-incomeeconomies.For example,anAPCof~$2000(i.e.themeanAPCfor2022according toOpenAPC)woulddisplace5 monthsofgraduatestudentsalaryin India,over2 monthssalaryforapostdocor6monthsofagraduate levelbursaryinSouthAfrica,andisroughlyequivalenttoamonth's salaryforamid-careerresearcherinmanymiddle-incomecountries inSouthAmericaandAfrica.HigherAPCscanseemdetachedfrom reality:for~$5 kauthorsmightpublishonepaper(e.g.inJournal of Biogeography)orless(e.g.inapanoplyofsecondtier'Nature'journals) or build a house-extension in South Africa (Dawson, 2023).…”

Shifts to open access with high article processing charges hinder research equity and careers

“…We, as Associate Editors (AEs) for the Journal of Biogeography , have serious concerns about the widespread shifts by John Wiley & Sons Ltd (Wiley) and other academic publishers to full Open Access (OA), which appears to be imminent for journals in the Wiley portfolio (Rieseberg et al, 2023) and has been discussed as a possibility for the Journal of Biogeography itself. We commend the philosophy of OA—to make research freely available online, but for many journals that shift to full OA, article publication is accompanied by expensive article processing charges (APCs) payable by the authors (see Laakso et al, 2011; Tennant et al, 2016).…”