Scientific journal publishing is a complicated and time-consuming process. It brings the most authentic and useful knowledge of the scholars to the world. Any type of carelessness can make the importance of research papers null and void.

At Agricultural Research Communication Centre (ARCC) double blind peer-review process has been followed from last 50 years to maintain the quality and standards of the journals. 

Therefore, ARCC journals give importance to the role of peer review as it is the only method of ensuring that the article contains the desired and useful information in it.

ARCC Journals is having Esteemed Reviewer’s panel of more than 5000 senior scale professionals from all around the globe and their profile are given on https://arccjournals.com/ourReviewers

The main objective of our Editors and Reviewers is to follow peer-review process to maintain the standards of the journals and helps the author to improve quality of the research. 

The peer-review process disapproves some of the ill-practices in the domain of scientific journal publishing. Any type of misconduct betrays the purpose of journal publishing.

The ARCC journals are very much professional about publishing the most knowledge-rich and original journals and emphasize the most comprehensive peer review.

The entire editorial process for article review is performed using ARCC online manuscript tracking system. We continuously innovate to provide cutting-edge tools and services for an efficient peer review.

Following criteria is applied for acceptance and rejection of manuscripts. Author may find further information on editorial and ethical policies, as well as in our author guidelines,  policies and publication ethics, and role of authors/authorship.

• Why do we use it?

As peer review is the process of reviewing the author’s work and studies to the inspection of other experts, it is aimed at serving two primary purposes.

Firstly, it filters the high-quality research for its publication in reputed journals by determining the validity, importance, and authenticity of the study.

Second, it enhances the quality of the manuscripts that are appropriate for publication. Peer reviewers give suggestions to the authors on how to make manuscripts better, and also find and correct any errors before forwarding them for publication.

Now you might be wondering what type of Peer Review does ARCC uses and why. Don’t worry we are just getting to that. ARCC mainly uses the Double-Blind type of Peer Review from last 5 decades in which the reviewers don’t know the names of the authors and the authors don’t know who reviewed the manuscript.

But we will not leave you in any doubt regarding this seemingly new process and clear everything you need to know about it in detail.

There is a proper set of steps that are followed by ARCC Journals in the complete process of journal peer-reviewing and it is discussed below:

The first step is the submission of research papers. Hundreds of research papers are submitted at

ARCC journals regularly. An author submits his manuscripts for publishing through the online submission portal on the ARCC website https://arccjournals.com/onlineSubmission

There is another way by which the author can submit his papers i.e. the good old E-Mail. The guidelines to the author may be found at: https://arccjournals.com/author-guidelines

• Editor First Opinion or Editor Screening

After the completion of the submission process, the manuscripts are sent to the editor for first opinion.

If Editor finds that the submitted papers don’t fulfil the process of the required subject, he holds the complete right of abandoning the further process of reviewing. The author informed accordingly if article got rejected at this point after editor first assessment.

Editor may notify the author for minor or major changes if found for further consideration. Author then need to resubmit the article again with all the required changes for re-screening.

Once the Editor is satisfied with the final manuscript and the manuscript passes the editor’s screening, it is forwarded to external reviewers for further review. The Editorial Board and Reviewer Panel is clearly displayed on each journal’s homepage.

Become a Reviewer/Editor

Manuscript reviewers are vital to the publication process. ARCC relies on the peer review process to maintain the quality of articles and the journals.

→ Register Now

At ARCC double blind peer-review process has been followed from last 50 years. After the initial green signal by the editor, the papers are sent to the suitable reviewers. Article may be send to more than 1 or 2 reviewer. Average time from submission to final decision: 61 days

• Double-Blind Peer Review – The Definition

In the Double-blind peer review, the identity of both the author and reviewer is kept secret. This mainly stops the reviewer from forming any partiality as the reviewer doesn’t know who wrote the article.

To aid this the authors need to make sure that their manuscripts are created in a way that doesn’t reveal their identity at any cost.

But as no process is entirely useful or harmful, the Double-Blind Peer Review also comes with its set of advantages and disadvantages. Let’s now discuss them in detail.

Advantages of Double-Blind Peer Review System

• More than 70% of academics all over the world have confidence in double-blind review system.
• Double-Blind Peer Review System gives pure and unbiased results.
• Empowers female authors. 

Disadvantages of Double-Blind Peer Review System

• Sometimes ruins the research of the paper.

The reviewers then monitor the manuscripts and extra papers (supporting documents) from the editor and determine whether they fulfil the standards of scientific guidelines or not. In the Double-blind peer review, the identity of both the author and reviewer is kept secret. This mainly stops the reviewer from forming any partiality as the reviewer doesn’t know who wrote the article. Editor provide a questionnaire (comments format) with the attachment of the article without author names and addresses.

We provide log in access to the Reviewer for submitting the comments through our portal https://arccjournals.com/login or comments with the questionnaire sheet can also submitted through email.

Following types of questions were asked to the reviewer, to provide an assessment of the various aspects of a manuscript:

SECTION I: Comments per Section of Manuscript

Reviewer is requested to provide comments and mark the corrections and changes required at each section of the manuscript in details under following heads:

• General comment: Reviewer summarize the outcome of the review.
• Introduction: Reviewer requested to go through the introduction part carefully to check are abstract, introduction and conclusion appropriate.
• Methodology: Reviewer check the validity of the approach, quality of the data and quality of presentation.
• Results: Reviewer then go through the results to find that the conclusions and data interpretation are robust, valid and reliable?
• Discussion: Reviewers will go through the study design, significance of the study, clarity of language, result presentation etc.

SECTION II 

• Bibliography/References: Check with the references for previous literature appropriately. Cross checking of all the references in the List and quoted in the text, what references should be included or excluded.
• Language: Reviewer requested to check with the language of the article to make it more meaningful.
• Decision: Reviewer give the decision and suggestions that could help strengthen the work in a revision.

SECTION III – Reviewer requested to rate the following ((1 = Excellent) (2 = Good) (3 = Fair) (4 = poor))

• Originality:
• Contribution to The Field:
• Technical Quality:
• Clarity of Presentation:
• Depth of Research:

SECTION IV – Recommandation given by the reviewer to proceed further: (Kindly Mark with An X)

Requires Minor Corrections:

Requires Moderate Revision:

Requires Major Revision:

Reject On Grounds Of (Please Be Specific):

Accept as it is:

SECTION V: Additional Comments (Reviewer give extra or additional comments depend upon the observations made, including comments/suggestions regarding online supplementary materials, if any)

Reviewer is then asked for willingness to review a revision of this manuscript?  Yes () No ()

Not all of the above aspects will necessarily apply to every paper, due to discipline-specific standards. When in doubt about discipline-specific peer-reviewing standards, reviewers can contact the Editor for guidance.

Reviewers should respect the confidentiality of material supplied to them and not to share data of unpublished manuscripts with colleagues or use the information in their own work.

Reviewer can also suggest other reviewer name to the editor if they find that the article is not related to their field of interest or have any conflict of interest.

Reviewers can be replaced to remove during the ongoing review process if editor found that the reviewer do not have the relevant expertise or have a conflict of interest in that particular manuscript.

The reviewers will also recommend publication to the journal editor. Based on the feedback and recommendations, the editor will decide whether the paper will be accepted or not, or sent for revision. The editor will write a decision letter to the authors.

Several times article will be send to more than 1 or 2 reviewers depend upon the time taken by first reviewer. In few circumstances reviewer was unable to send the comments on time and to avoid further delay article may send to more than 1 reviewer. 

It is quite rare for a paper to be accepted as the original draft. In case the manuscripts don’t fulfil the standards of scientific guidelines, the suggestions are made to the editor to take the required steps.

If reviewer has any conflicts of interest, then it should be informed to the Editor before accepting and invitation to review the article. All the information between Reviewer and Editors will not be shared with authors.

Sometimes review process takes much longer than usual due to some unavoidable circumstances (delay in process due to unavoidable error) we request authors to suggest potential reviewers (other than their colleagues from same institution), who can give fair comments on the article. Editors will consider these requests, but are not obliged to fulfil them. The Editor's decision on the choice of peer reviewers is final.

Peer reviewer misconduct

Providing false or misleading information—for example, identity theft and suggesting fake peer-reviewers—will result in rejection of the manuscript, further investigation will be done by the editorial committee according to journal policies, and notification to the authors’ institutions/employers.

It is our request for the reviewers to respond promptly within the specific period of time with their expert comments. ARCC journals are committed to rapid editorial decisions through and publication, and we believe that it can be achieved through an efficient editorial process which is valuable both to our authors and to the reviewers, editors as a whole.

Article may be rejected at any stage before complete publication of the article, including during initial screening, peer review process, revised article, final decision and, if issues arrived at late-stage e.g. online publication, also post-acceptance, for the following reasons:

• If Editor found that there is research misconduct or publication misconduct has taken place.
• Fabrication of data
• If the research or findings have previously been published in some other publication without permission or justification.
• Where there is fraudulent authorship.
• In case research constitutes plagiarism more than allowed percentage.
• If Editor found evidence of unethical research.
• The integrity of research may also be compromised by an inappropriate methodology that could lead to retraction.
• If the authors have not adhered to our authorship guidelines.
• The references are clearly and do not reflect the current status of knowledge in the field.

After the reviewers have submitted the expert comments, the editor is responsible for initiate the next stage, the interactive review, to send the comments to the authors. Editor has the authority to add more comments if found some more corrections or errors which were not carried out by the reviewer.

If the editor would like to reject the manuscript during the review phase, they can do so by activating the interactive review phase with major concerns, providing the authors with the detailed statement and a unique opportunity for rebuttal during a defined timeframe.

Why it is important?

Scientific research can be far more meaningful for individuals and the community. And because of this, it goes through a quality control process known as ‘Peer-review’ before its publication.

The Peer review process involves reviewing the author’s work and studies to the inspection of other experts to check its validity and suitability for publication. Simply put, a peer review lets the editor decide whether a work should be published or not.

According to ARCC, Peer Review has the following additional benefits:

Peer review makes the manuscripts more robust as peer reviewers point out the areas in paper that need more explanation or study.

Peer review also makes the manuscripts much easier to read as the reviewers suggest changes that eases their difficulty.

Lastly peer reviewers make the manuscripts more useful as peer reviewers keep in mind the importance of your paper to others in your domain.

Once the editor initiates the interactive review phase, authors are notified immediately through system generated email with the attachment of questionnaire and reviewed article done by the reviewer. Authors are asked to respond and/or submit a revised manuscript within specific time frame, depending on the level of revisions required.

If there are no response received from the author after multiple reminders attempts, the editorial office will send a final email to the authors with a 10 days’ deadline to respond. Following this, the editorial office may delete or withdraw the manuscript from the system completely and author will be informed accordingly.

The suggestions made by the reviewer are closely observed by the editor. In case there is a requirement from the author to provide the missing documents, he is asked to do so. The editor also assists the author to follow the necessary guidelines for journal publishing.

According to the editors, the article has important information along with some issues and concerns. The authors need to go through and consider the comments of the reviewers carefully as the revision will largely be based on those comments.

The authors also need to respond to each comment point by point indicating the changes, whether or not a revision can be done or give sufficient information properly.

The authors need to follow the instructions on how to submit revision to the editor:

• Article must be complete with author names and addresses.
• No Track changes or comments on the revised article.
• References must be as per format.
• Reviewers' comments response should be mentioned in email or in different word file.
• Text Alignment, line spacing, word count, figures, tables etc must be as per format.

The editor cross-checks and takes into consideration all the important amendments and revisions carried out by the author as per the comments and directions before making the final decision.

The editor can then send the corrected article again to the reviewer in case the need arises. He can even return the article to the author if it is not worked up according to the research and format.

After the revision is done, the authors submit the revised paper again to the journal. The revision will pass the review through the editor only or by both the reviewers and editors for the next round.

In few circumstances a dispute may arises at this stage, then the editor acts as a mediator, working with all involved to resolve the issues and even add new reviewers for further opinions if needed. Still if the disagreement persists, the specific journal chief editor is then requested to take initiate and assess the situation, and take a final call as to whether the review should be ended by rejecting the manuscript or continued – potentially, with a new handling editor and reviewers.

The review is complete only once all the reviewer and editor comments have been satisfactorily addressed by the author.

Then the authors may get a final decision. Usually if the editor and the reviewers think that the revision has addressed their previous issues adequately and the paper has improved post-revision, the paper will move forward for the last step.

The power of approving or rejecting an article completely lies with the editor. If some changes are found in the article, the author can be asked for resubmitting the article.

In case the articles are found fabricated, falsified, or inflated on intention, the resubmission of the article can again be rejected by the editor.

If the paper is accepted, an acceptance letter is issued to the authors. The authors may be required to complete certain formalities as a prerequisite for publication. The manuscript will then be edited and put into final production.

The article processing charge (APC) is payable within 30 days of acceptance and is required before final publication of the manuscript.

Acceptance

If the editor finds the article well enough for acceptance in its final form, an acceptance letter is issued to the author.

The editor can then either accept the final version of the manuscript or request further changes as necessary, typically within a few days. Acceptance of a manuscript by the editor does not require the approval of the journal chief editor.

Rejection

During this stage, a manuscript may be rejected at any point for the following reasons:

• If Editor found evidence of unethical research that prevent further consideration or publication.
• Errors founds in the methods, applications, or interpretations were identified in the manuscript.
• If the standards established for the journal is not fulfil by the manuscript to be considered for publication
• If author doesn’t revise the article carefully and unable to address the concerns raised by the reviewers or editor during the review process

If a manuscript is rejected, no APC or other fee is charged.

The submitted articles are worked on before the production process. World-class services are employed to create the finest writing piece for readership. The content is also arranged with the best typography standards and the tables and figures are arranged properly for printing.

The journal is then made presentable through the international guidelines and, finally the re-prints are sent to the author for final corrections.

As soon as author finalize the reprints of the article, it is processed for DOI generation. Once the DOI is generated from crossref, article processed for online publication on the website under the menu Online First articles https://arccjournals.com/onlineFirstArticles

The articles are published online in a proper manner. Author may download the PDF of the article through provided log in details. It is once again responsibility of the author to check with the online content as well as PDF text before final publication.

After going through the detailed process, the ultimate process of the journal process is begun. All the required approvals from the different sections of the publication house are checked again so that no error at the time of the final publication of the printed journal is detected.

As soon as article got selected for particular issues, its final publication process is completed and assigned Volume, Issue and Page number. ​

Post the final publication, the author is requested to get the final copy of the printed journal. Author may find the complete published article on https://arccjournals.com/currentIssues

ARCC is committed to recognizing the invaluable service performed by our dedicated peer reviewers. As part of our appreciation program, reviewer will receive review certificate for the articles reviewed.

All Reviewer’s Personalized Profile are available on our website https://arccjournals.com/ourReviewers.

Reviewer can edit or update their profile anytime and has the history of all previous articles reviewed through the reviewer’s portal.

When the reviewer has completed at least two reviews, they become a ‘Recognized Reviewer’ and ARCC award them with a 'Reviewer Excellence Certificate’.

If a reviewer has completed at least ten reviews in two years, they become an ‘Outstanding Reviewer’ and 'recommended for Executive or Editorial Board Member’ for any of the ARCC Journals.