Peer Review Process

Reviewing Procedure

1. The author submits an article and author’s abstracts that meets requirements and rules of the interdepartmental thematic scientific collection “Foothill and mountain agriculture and stockbreeding” for publication to the editorial board. Manuscripts that do not meet the requirements are not registered and are denied further consideration, and their authors are notified about it. 
2. All manuscripts submitted to the editorial board are sent along to two reviewers according to their scientific interest. The reviewers are appointed by the editor-in-chief of the interdepartmental thematic scientific collection “Foothill and mountain agriculture and stockbreeding”. By decision of the editor-in-chief (under certain circumstances), the appointment of reviewers can be assigned to a member of the editorial board. In some cases, the choice of reviewers is decided at a meeting of the editorial board.
3. The reviewer must carry out research in the specialty and have at least one publication in journals included in the List of professional scientific periodicals of Ukraine, or foreign periodicals included in the Web of Science Core Collection and/or Scopus, or have monographs or sections of monographs published by international publishers of categories “A”, “B” or “C” according to the classification of the Research School for Socio-Economic and Natural Sciences of the Environment (SENSE) for the last three years.
4. After receiving the article for consideration (within 7 days), the reviewer evaluates the possibility of reviewing the materials, based on the correspondence of his own qualifications to the direction of the author’s research and the absence of any conflict of interest. If there are any competing interests, the reviewer should refuse to review and notify the editorial board about this. The latter should decide on the appointment of another reviewer.
5. The reviewer within 21 days evaluates the article on the possibility of its publication. The terms of the review can be changed in each case to ensure conditions for the most objective assessment of the quality of the materials provided.
6. Reviewing is carried out confidentially according to the principles of double-blind reviewing. The interaction between the author and reviewers occurs through the executive secretary of the collection. At the request of the reviewer and in agreement with the working group of the editorial board, the interaction between author and reviewer can occur in open mode (such a decision is made only if the openness of the interaction will improve the style and logic of the presentation of the research material).
7. The reviewer after the final analysis of the article fills out the standard form (Appendix 1), which he certifies by electronic signature and sends via e-mail to editor. Generally accepted recommendations on the sequence and organization of the review process were used and summarized while preparing the form. The editor sends author the results of the review via email.
8. If the reviewer indicates the need to make certain adjustments to the article, the article is sent to the author with the proposal to take into account the comments when preparing an updated version or to refute them with arguments. The author submits letter along with revised article containing answers to all comments and explanations of all the changes that were made. The revised version is once again provided to the reviewer to make a decision and prepare a reasoned opinion on the possibility of publication. The date the article is accepted for publication is the date the editorial board received the positive opinion of the reviewer (or the decision of the editorial board) on the appropriateness and possibility of article publishing.
9. In case of disagreement with the reviewer’s opinion, author has the right to provide a reasoned answer to the editorial board. In this case, the article is considered at a meeting of the working group of the editorial board. The editorial board may send the article to another specialist for additional or new review. The editorial board reserves the right to reject articles in case of inability or unwillingness of the author to take into account the wishes and comments of reviewers. The editorial board at the request of the reviewer may submit the article to another reviewer with mandatory compliance with the principles of double-blind review.
10. The final decision on the possibility and expediency of publication is made by the editor-in-chief (or, on his behalf, a member of the editorial board), if necessary – by a meeting of the editorial board as a whole. After decision on the admission of the article to publication, the executive secretary notifies the author and indicates the expected date of publication.
11. In case of a positive decision on the possibility of publication, the article is published in order of priority and relevance (in some cases, by decision of the editor-in-chief, the article can be published out of turn, in the next issue of the collection).
12. The Scientific Council of the Institute of Agriculture of Carpathian Region of NAAS approves the final composition of printed articles, which is noted on the second page of the collection.
13. The article approved for publication is sent to the editor. After stylistic and formal corrections, that do not affect the content, the article (scanned copy with amendments) is sent to the author for revision. After all the amendments, the article is submitted in print.
14. Responsibility for copyright infringement and non-compliance with applicable standards in the materials of the article lies with the author. Responsibility for the accuracy of the facts and data, the validity of the conclusions and recommendations, scientific and practical level of the article lies with the author and reviewer.