News

Journal BioControl, News from the Editor

Indices and Impact Factor

The situation in 2023 appeared to be improved compared to the previous year. The journal received around 300 MS and there was an increase in the number of papers (and pages) we published. The last impact factor we got was 2.5. The next impact factor (for 2023) will be released in June 2023. The proportion of '0-cited" articles (i.e., articles that are never cited in the literature) remains stable (i.e., slightly below 25%).

However, we still need more accepted MS, which means more MS submitted. Ideally, we need to increase the number of papers cited in the international literature, which means – among other things – to publish more review articles and more Special Issues (see below). This will boost the Impact Factor, which in turn will attract more MS submissions, etc.

Review articles

Last year (2023) we published 10 review articles, but 9 of them were in a Special Issue. So, actually only one review was published "independently". This is not enough. The entire editorial board is looking for potential authors willing to submit review articles to BioControl. Ideally, it would be good to have at least three review articles per year (one every two issues), or even more.

Special Issues

One Special issue was published in 2023 (June issue) coming from a IOBC-Global Working Group (ABS and the Nagoya protocol; guest editors: P. Mason & B. Barratt). One was just released in 2024 (June issue) on "Biological Control of Weeds and Arthropods" (guest editors: P. Mason & M. Schwarzländer), and another one is planned for 2024 on conservation biological control of stinkbugs (guest editors: F. Congolani & R. Laumann). Here too, it would be good to have other Special Issue proposals.

Miscellaneous issues

The MS handling time (from first submission to first decision) is still stable (less than two weeks, on average, before the first decision), which is a good indicator of the journal's good health.
Finally, finding referees is becoming more and more difficult, as this is also the case for all international journals. Springer offers now a referees-seeking tool that should help.

Eric Wajnberg, Ëditor in Chief

www.springer.com/life+sci/entomology/journal/10526