Editor's Note

What Does The Journal Actually Publish

 In Volume 12(2), my Editor's Note presented a brief description of our working hypotheses regarding the important factors determining the quality of a journal like IJFE and identified seven of them. In individual papers, we were concerned about topic focus, rigour, innovation and communication effectiveness. In assessing whole volumes, we were concerned with the form of scholarship (e.g., research results versus review papers), relevance to scholars and practitioners and, finally, geographical focus.

 In this note, I want to review the Journal's publication record with respect to three of these factors: topic focus, form of scholarship and geographical focus. The reasons for starting with these is that the data could be readily obtained and would provide some useful information to guide the Journal's efforts in recruiting submissions.

Topic Focus

In the last five years, the IJFE has mainly published papers dealing with forest harvesting (ground and cable logging) and forest operations planning (see Table 1). These three topic areas account for almost 53% of papers published in Volumes 8-12. It is interesting to note the relatively minor role (9%) played by road building, transportation and machine management, all three traditional core areas of forest engineering. It is also interesting to note that environmental impacts and their mitigation represented only one of 77 publications over the five year analysis period. This is particularly odd as environmental goals and constraints are one of the key drivers of change in silviculture, logging and road building technology and practices. Operational papers dealing with reforestation are also a minor component of the publication mix for the Journal, this in spite of the fact that it is one of the main forest operations in North and South America and Europe. All these gaps point to areas to be targeted to increase the number of publication submitted to the Journal if we are to ensure that all key areas of forest engineering represented in our publications.

Table 1. Number of papers published by topic area^* from 1996-2001

Form of Scholarship

 Here we recognize three main categories of scholarship: developing theory, presenting experimental results and, finally, reviewing and synthesizing existing knowledge and identifying key questions. Research results papers contain both a theoretical framework and actual empirical data. Theoretical papers contain a theoretical framework but no empirical data (although some of these present illustrative samples of calculations to explain theory). Technical notes are shorter pieces focussed on either theoretical concepts or experimental results, but not of sufficient scope or depth to warrant being labelled research results papers. Review papers present no original scientific data or theory, but rather synthesize existing knowledge and raise questions about key issues. Review papers include formal scientific review articles, book reviews and editorials. Although grouped with reviews, editorials are mainly argumentative pieces raising questions or passing comment without necessarily synthesizing existing knowledge in a systematic way.

 Table 2 shows the distribution of types of papers published in the last five years. The IJFE publishes preponderantly (80%) scientific research papers. This is consistent with the Journal's role as a scientific journal. However, other journals that carry content in the forest engineering and forest operations area (e.g., the Forest Products Journal) publish a more even distribution of the different types of papers. The question of paper type is important if the Journal is to address itself effectively to the needs of forest engineering practitioners as well as academics.

Table 2. Number of papers published by type from 1996-2001.

Geographical Focus

 Papers published in the Journal in the last five years originate predominantly in four key countries (see Table 3) or regions: Scandinavia, the United States of America, New Zealand and Canada. All these regions are large forest products producers and have significant research infrastructure in the form of well established government, academic and industry-funded research institutions. It is noteworthy that other countries with substantial forestry activity and mature research institutions contribute very few papers to the Journal. For example, note the virtual absence of papers from German- and French-speaking countries of continental Europe, from Eastern Europe, Russia and South America, from Japan and Australia. As a result, the Journal currently draws its content from a much smaller geographical basin than its readership. Hits to the Journal's Web site provide some information as to the Journal's readership (see Figures 1 and 2). The countries listed in Figure 1 (and 31 others not listed there) all contribute to the readership base of the Journal. The absence of so many significant players in the forest engineering field from the Journal's list of habitual contributors suggests that there is substantial room to grow in terms of contributions of papers. It also indicates a need to promote the Journal in those areas to increase submissions.

Table 3. Number of papers published between 1996 and 2001 by country or region of origin^*.

Figure 1. Geographical distribution of IJFE of Web site hits from countries other than Canada and the United States.

Figure 2. Geographical distribution of IJFE of Web site hits from top countries.

Conclusion

 The type of scholarship published in the Journal is appropriate for a scientific publication. However, if the Journal hopes to make a positive contribution to the practice of forest engineering it will need to assess its relevance to practitioners and determine how to make its contents accessible to that audience without sacrificing the rigour that makes it useful to scholars and researchers. We will be exploring how our current editorial policy with respect to format can be used to better address the needs of practitioners.

It is clear that there is substantial room to grow contributions to the Journal, both in terms of topic and geographical focus. There is benefit to the whole forest engineering community making more high quality scholarship available to all its members. The Journal will therefore be working on expanding its contribution base and would be pleased to work with international or national academic, and research organizations to this end.

Pierre Zundel
Managing Editor