Editorial

The Journal of Agricultural Science (Cambridge) continues to flourish. We are delighted to report that our current Impact Factor is 2.603 and Citescore is 2.8. We continue to cover a very broad range of topics within the Agricultural Sciences, covering both Soil/Crop Sciences and Animal Sciences. This year we will be introducing a third category: the Integration of Crops/Soils and Animals. We continue to welcome submissions in ‘Climate Change and Agriculture’ and ‘Modelling Animal Systems’. Last year we decided to consider submissions that are based on cell/molecular biology as long as an agricultural impact is evident and it is pleasing to note that papers in this area have been submitted/published. We are also happy to consider papers covering the ‘Environmental Impact of Agricultural Systems’.

It is always a pleasure to acknowledge the vital role of our Editorial Board in identifying reviewers and then collating their responses before submitting their decisions and reports to be considered by the Editors-in-Chief. This year we said goodbye to Sandeep Kumar (Soil/Crop Sciences, May 2022) and Ed Charmley (Animals, December 2022); we thank them both for their very important contributions. This year we have welcomed six new Editors: for Crops and Soil Science, Bruno Pedreira (Kansas State University, USA), Simerjeet Kaur (Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, India) and Darshani Kumaragamage (University of Winnipeg, Canada) and for Animals, Randhir Bhatt (ICAR-Central Sheep and Wool Research Institute, India), Sameer Pant (Charles Sturt University, Australia) and Joao Daniel (Universidade Estadual de Maringá, Brazil). The Affiliations and countries of our Editorial Board are clear evidence that we are truly an international Journal. Of course, reviewers themselves are a very important element of overall journal activities; the supplementary file attached to this Editorial listing the 2022 Reviewers with their affiliations and countries again demonstrates the global nature of the journal (see Supplementary File ‘AGS Reviewers 2022.pdf’). We are, as always, indebted to all those who give their time and expertize voluntarily.

We have an extremely effective and efficient support team at Cambridge University Press and the Editors-in-Chief are very grateful for this input.

We review journal policies continuously and are pleased to remind authors of the following recent developments:

• • Original submissions may be format-neutral – meaning that authors do not have to format references, etc. in the style used by this Journal for initial submissions – thus, submissions which do not conform to journal requirements can now be sent out for review (if considered potentially suitable for publication) rather than back to authors for editing. This helps to hasten the overall review process. It should be noted, however, that certain aspects are still mandatory:

  1. (1) Since the journal is single-blind, all papers must begin with the title page, including author names, affiliations and the email address of the corresponding author.

  2. (2) All authors must be entered on ScholarOne during the relevant submission step, with working email addresses.

  3. (3) For research articles, the Results MUST be separate from the Discussion section.

  4. (4) Authors must use the Word formatting template available on the website (and also available as a Supplementary File with this Editorial: ‘AGS Formatting Template.docx’) for revised papers.

• • In addition to our existing required disclosure sections (Financial Support, Conflicts of Interest and Ethical Standards), we have also introduced ‘Statements of Authors’ Contributions’, which are now required for every submitted paper. If not provided at first submission, authors will be asked for these later. This may delay sending accepted manuscripts to Production, so it is best to include them in your original submission.

• • Once accepted manuscripts have been finalized and sent to Production, corresponding authors are now prompted to confirm or enter information online to create their Author Publishing Agreement, using the online platform Ironclad. The prepared form is then made available for the corresponding author to sign online, removing the need for manual signing and scanning of copyright forms.

• • After the Author Publishing Agreement has been completed, accepted manuscripts are published (without typesetting) a few days later at https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-agricultural-science/accepted-manuscripts. These have a DOI and can be cited; they are replaced in due course with the typeset version, as the version of record. This means that authors’ work is published and in the public domain more quickly and is just one way that we are striving to reduce the time taken from initial submission to publication.

• • We are currently trialling Paperpal Preflight (a service that instantly checks a manuscript against submission guidelines and flags any potential issues that might prevent the paper from passing the initial checks made by the Editorial Office). The tool is free to use, although there is also an optional paid-for service that provides a tracked-changes version of the submission in a report with suggested modifications. These also include recommendations about spelling, punctuation and grammar. There is a link to this service on the ScholarOne homepage.

We would like to remind authors that help with the Manuscript Central ScholarOne site is always available. In addition to journal-specific on-screen instructions as you go through the submission process, there are also general resources available by clicking the Help button near the top right of the ScholarOne screen. This opens the ScholarOne Manuscripts Support page, where you can find resources tailored to your role, including FAQs, videos and even training sessions. You can also email the Journal office ([email protected]) for journal-specific help and advice.

Finally, it is great to announce that from January 2023, the journal is now online only, which will have tremendous benefits in terms of sustainability.

With many thanks to all who are engaged in the journal and, of course, to our very wide readership who we trust continue to be motivated and informed by its contents.