
We’re happy to share reports from three more projects strengthening the quality and sustainability of no-fee open access (OA) journals in Africa.
Together, the three projects strengthen a total of seven journals – five in Ghana and two in South Africa. The projects were among 17 in nine countries that were awarded grants in 2024 through the three-year project, ‘Collaboration for Sustainable Open Access Publishing in Africa', funded by Wellcome. The grants specifically target no-fee OA (also known as Diamond OA) journals and journal platforms. Diamond OA means that the journals do not charge any fees for publishing or reading articles.
ENHANCING JOURNAL MANAGEMENT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF GHANA
The University of Ghana (UG) implemented a project to strengthen the management, overall efficiency and output of no-fee OA journals hosted by the UG Journal Management Services. Five no-fee OA journals were selected to participate in the project:
- Contemporary Journal of African Studies, published by the UG Institute of African Studies;
- Ghana Journal of Geography, published by the university’s Department of Geography and Resource Development;
- Ghana Journal of Religion and Theology, published by the university’s Department for the Study of Religion;
- Health Sciences Investigations Journal, published by the university’s College of Health Sciences; and
- Science and Development Journal, published by the UG College of Basic and Applied Sciences.
The grant supported drafting of a comprehensive university-wide journal policy to guide establishment, operations and funding of UG journals; improving editorial process and management of the journals, and enhancing visibility, communications of the journals and collaboration between journal teams. Read more about the results of the 'Enhancing Journal Management at the University of Ghana' project.
THE AFRICAN JOURNAL OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION
The African Journal of Information and Communication (AJIC) is a peer-reviewed, no-fee OA academic journal published by the Wits Link Centre, based at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. It is accredited by the South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), and indexed in the Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO) SA, South Africa’s leading OA full-text journal database, and in the globally recognized Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ).
The EIFL grant strengthened AJIC by increasing the discoverability and visibility of its articles and authors, deepening subject-matter expertise on its Editorial Advisory Board and enhancing recognition of its peer reviewers. Read more about new developments at AJIC.
JOURNAL OF STUDENT AFFAIRS IN AFRICA
The no-fee OA Journal of Student Affairs in Africa (JSAA) is the leading scholarly and professional platform for student affairs in African higher education. It amplifies diverse African voices, bridges theory and practice and contributes to the enhancement of student growth, wellbeing and success across the continent. It is published twice a year by its founders and owners, the JSAA Editors, in collaboration with the University of Pretoria (UP) in South Africa and the OA non-profit academic publisher, African Minds. The journal has Department of Higher Education and Training of South Africa accreditation, and is currently hosted by UP’s Faculty of Education.
The EIFL grant has helped to create a sustainable no-fee OA future for the journal by inaugurating and training a new editorial team and journal manager, drafting a comprehensive operational manual for the journal, developing a communications strategy to enhance the JSAA’s online presence and visibility, and agreeing a sustainability plan for the next 10 years. Read more about new developments at the JSAA.
See the results of two projects, shared previously, to strengthen OA journals in Africa.
We look forward to sharing more project results as the reports come in.
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