Editor Guidelines

Editor Responsibilities

Editors play a crucial role in shaping high-quality scholarly content by overseeing the editorial review process and ensuring the integrity of publications. Their responsibilities include:

• Managing the Peer Review Process: Ensuring that reviews are fair, unbiased, and conducted promptly by selecting qualified reviewers and facilitating the review process through the submission platform.
• Assessing Manuscripts Objectively: Evaluating submissions based solely on intellectual merit, free from bias or external influence.
• Maintaining Ethical Standards: Avoiding actions that could artificially manipulate journal metrics and rankings.
• Ensuring Confidentiality: Protecting all submitted materials and reviewer communications from unauthorized access.
• Avoiding AI Misuse: Refraining from uploading submitted manuscripts or any portion of them into generative AI tools.
• Defining the Scope and Importance of Topics: Refining the subject focus and emphasizing its significance within the field.
• Identifying and Inviting Contributors: Collaborating with the journal's editorial team to select potential authors and curate content for special issues.
• Managing Timelines: Overseeing the article production schedule, including writing, reviewing, and final submission, to ensure timely publication.
• Coordinating with Other Editors: Working alongside the journal editor and fellow editors to identify suitable contributors and respond to author inquiries.
• Overseeing Initial Peer Review: Using subject matter expertise to guide the preliminary review process, including making initial desk decisions and suggesting revisions. However, the Editor-in-Chief retains the final decision on acceptance.
• Structuring and Summarizing Content: Organizing the publication's running order, drafting an editorial summary, and providing any additional information requested by the editorial team.
• Promoting Published Work: Assisting in marketing efforts by identifying relevant events, partnerships, funding opportunities, or other elements that could enhance the article's reach and visibility.

Guidelines to Authors

LUANAR Research Journal (LURJ) is a biannual, double-blinded peer-reviewed, open-access journal that publishes original research papers, short communications and review papers on the following subject areas: animal production and veterinary sciences; aquaculture and fisheries sciences; bio-resources systems, engineering, and technology; biotechnology; crop sciences; agricultural and development economics, agribusiness, extension, and rural development; natural resources, energy, and climate change; health, nutrition and food science, cross-cutting issues and any other related areas.

1.0 Submission of Manuscripts

1.1 Types of articles

• Original research articles: These should describe new and carefully confirmed findings. Experimental procedures should be given in sufficient detail so that others can reproduce the results. The length of a full paper should be the minimum required to describe and interpret the work clearly, most preferably a minimum of 4-8 double-spaced printed pages) and not exceeding 15 pages maximum or 9500 words maximum.
• Short communications: Short communications present preliminary but significant research results. These are results of complete small investigations or details of new models or hypotheses, innovative methods, techniques, or apparatus. The style of the main sections need not conform to that of full-length paper. Short communications are 2 to 4 double-spaced printed pages with a maximum of 5200 words.
• Reviews: Submissions of reviews and perspectives covering topics of current interest are welcomed and encouraged. Reviews should be concise and no longer than (about 4 to 6 double-spaced printed pages). The maximum number of words is 2600. Reviews are also peer-reviewed.

1.2. Submission process

Manuscripts for LURJ should be submitted to the following email address: lurj@luanar.ac.mw. The submitting author, generally the corresponding author, is responsible for the manuscript during the submission and peer-review processes. The corresponding author must ensure that all co-authors have been included in the author list and that they all have read and approved the submitted version of the manuscript. Authors must use Microsoft WORD to prepare and submit their manuscripts.

1.3. Cover letter

A cover letter must be included with each manuscript submission. It should be concise and explain why the content of your paper is significant, placing your findings in the context of existing work and why it fits the scope of the journal. Please confirm that the manuscript is currently not under consideration for publication in another journal.

2.0. Preparation of the Manuscript

2.1. Manuscript layout and structure

Manuscripts should be typewritten in English. Any non-English words are prohibited in the papers (if not the subject of the reported research). British English should be used. Your paper must use a page size corresponding to A4 which is 210 mm (8.27 inches) wide and 297 mm (11.69 inches) long. The margins must be set as follows:

• Top and Bottom, 25 mm (0.98 inches)
• Left and Right, 30 mm (1.18 inches)
• The manuscript should be prepared using Time Roman font size 10-12 with wide margins of 1.5cm lines. Number lines will be included in the left margin for the review process. All pages must be numbered at the bottom.

Research manuscripts should comprise:

• Front Matter - Title, Author list, Affiliations, Abstract, Keywords
• Research manuscript section - Introduction, Materials and Methods (or Methodology), Results, Discussion (or Results and Discussion), and Conclusions
• Back Matter - Acknowledgments, Author Contributions, Conflict of Interests, and References

2.1.1. Front Matter

The following sections of Front matter should appear in all manuscript types:

• Title: The title of your manuscript should be concise, specific, and relevant i.e. it should reflect the subject of the manuscript. When gene or protein names are included, the abbreviated name rather than the full name should be used. Generally, no acronym is allowed in the title.
• Author names and affiliations: Authors' full first and last names must be provided. The initials of any middle names can be added. Authors' names will be followed by an upper-script number indicating the affiliation(s) of the authors. Affiliations are numbered and listed and include the full postal address, country, and e-mail address. An author may provide one or more affiliations, if necessary, but all of them will be referenced by upper-script numbers. The corresponding author will be indicated with an asterisk (*) and should include contact telephone and email address. If an author has moved since the work was done or was visiting at the time, a "present address" may be provided.
• Abstract: The abstract should be a maximum of 250 words. The abstract should be a single paragraph and should follow the style of structured abstracts, but without headings: 1) Background: Place the question addressed in a broad context and highlight the purpose of the study; 2) Methods: Describe briefly the main methods or treatments applied; 3) Results: Summarize the article's main findings; and 4) Conclusion: Indicate the main conclusions or interpretations. The abstract should be an objective representation of the article: it must not contain results that are not presented and substantiated in the main text and should not exaggerate the main conclusions.
• Keywords: Authors should provide 4-6 keywords separated with semicolons (;). The keywords should be up-to-date and specific to the article, yet reasonably common within the subject discipline.