About the Journal

Focus, thematic coverage, and objectives. 

A semiannual periodic publication journal, edited by Universidad Nacional de Loja, whose objective is to contribute to scientific and technological knowledge, thus contributing to the development and strengthening of research in the country.

Target audience

The "Bosques Latitud Cero" Journal is aimed at researchers, teachers, students, and professionals related to the following areas:

• Silviculture of native forests and plantations;
• Renewable natural resources;
• Forest production;
• Biodiversity;
• Timber and non-timber forest products;
• Wood technology;
• Watersheds and water resources;
• Forest industries;
• Agroforestry and silvopastures;
• Economics and trade related to forest products;
• Rural socioeconomic development;
• Genetics, forest, and agricultural improvement;
• Agricultural pests and diseases;
• Environmental land planning;
• Ecological restoration and climate change.

Peer review process

General Review

The journal has an editorial board, an international advisory committee, and a group of reviewers composed of experts in the field within and outside the country. The reviewers have no connection with the authors or their affiliated institutions. Reviewers are sent an evaluation form used to organize and collect the required comments and observations.

Once the article is submitted to the journal for review, the manuscript is sent to an editor who decides if the topic addressed is related to the areas of interest and if the article meets the minimum requirements to continue the process. If the submission does not meet the minimum expectations, the authors must make improvements and submit a better version of the article. If these improvements meet the editor's requirements, the process of selecting the article's reviewers begins.

Peer Review

In this step, the editor sends the article to external reviewers. Each article will have at least two reviewers who will have a total of three weeks to return the article with one of the following comments:

• Accept (No changes required).
• Changes required (The article cannot be published as it is. The editor must inform the authors of the necessary corrections).
• Send for a new review (The article requires substantial changes. The editor must return the article to the author, and the author must make the required corrections. The author must resubmit the article and go through the review process again).
• Send to a different journal (the scope of the article does not match the scope of the journal).
• Reject (The submitted manuscript must be rejected as it is).
• See comments (A comments section will be included in certain cases of rejection, such as plagiarism or similar attempts of intellectual offense).

The editor selects the reviewers and evaluators considering their experience and academic knowledge of a specific topic, which must match that of the article. Another aspect to consider is that the reviewers must have already traveled the path of research and have recognition in the area in terms of their contribution and ethical principles. If the reviewers consider that they cannot review an article for different reasons, they must inform the editor. Some reasons why a reviewer may not continue with the review of an article are related, among others, to family ties with the authors, prior knowledge of the article, and any other conflicts of interest they may encounter.

Double-blind peer review

Double-blind peer review means that the identity of both the author and the reviewer is kept hidden. If the reviewer is unaware of the authors' identity, it will prevent the reviewer from forming any bias. This ensures objectivity in the review process.

Upon receiving the evaluation, the author has two weeks to submit the corrected version of the manuscript. Subsequently, the editor will have five weeks to make a final decision on the acceptance or rejection of the article. In the event of disagreements between the editor and the reviewers, the editor will be responsible for making the final decision. An important point to highlight is that all individuals involved in the process (authors, editors, reviewers) will be able to verify the status of the article and will be notified of each step taken and each decision made. If all participants involved respect the indicated timelines and follow the process accordingly, the article will have gone through the entire process in an estimated time of three months and two weeks and would be ready for publication.

The criteria for deciding whether an article is accepted or not are available in the evaluation tool. These criteria are as follows:

• The topic aligns with the journal's areas of interest.
• The article makes a significant contribution to the literature.
• The included information is useful and helps address an existing problem.
• The article is new and has not been published before.
• It is original or meta-analytical.
• The proposed methodological design of the article is sound and fully relates to the problem addressed.
• The results are addressed objectively.
• The conclusions are coherent and show sufficient support.
• The article as a whole is well-organized, coherent, and well-written in terms of mechanics and language usage.

Frequency of Publication

This journal has a biannual periodicity: January to June and July to December.

Open Access Policy

Bosques Latitud Cero is open access. This means that readers will have complete and free access to all the information available online. This includes reading, downloading, saving, printing, searching, indexing, using data for software development, and linking the full texts to external sources.

In addition, the journal allows the use of preprint, postprint, and the official published version of the article for different purposes, without seeking the author's or editor's permission. The only requirements for this are to avoid using the article for commercial purposes and to give credit to the original source and authors (The Bosques Latitud Cero Journal by Universidad Nacional de Loja is licensed under a Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial-CompartirIgual 4.0 Internacional License. Based on a work at https://revistas.unl.edu.ec/index.php/bosques/oai)

Copyright Notice

Once an article is accepted for publication, the author(s) agree that, from that date forward, the copyright owner of their work(s) is the Bosques Latitud Cero journal. Reproduction of published articles (or sections thereof) for non-commercial purposes is permitted, provided the source is acknowledged. Authors are free to deposit their published manuscripts in any non-commercial open access repository. Accepted but unpublished articles (preprints) may not be distributed by any means. Violation of this rule may result in the withdrawal of the accepted article.

Originality Notice

Only original works that have not been previously published will be published; failure to meet these requirements will result in non-publication.

The submission of an article must be accompanied by a cover letter requesting the publication of the article in the journal, declaring its originality, stating that the article has not been previously published, and indicating that the article has been approved by all of its authors.

The Journal reserves the right to use plagiarism analysis with Copyleaks and/or Turnitin to determine the originality percentage of the manuscript before proceeding with the publication process.

Indexes and Databases

Latindex Catálogo 2.0

Red Iberoamericana de Innovación y Conocimiento Científico