Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing

Enacted in October 26, 2022

1. Name of Journal

The official journal title is Proceedings of the National Institute of Ecology of the Republic of Korea. Abbreviated title is PNIE.

2. Website

i. The URL address of official journal website is https://pnie.accesson.kr/.

ii. 'Aims and Scope' statement

It aims to promote, but is not limited to, the achievements of basic ecological research conducted at home and abroad. The prospective audience is researchers conducting global collaborative research as well as ecological studies in the Asia-Pacific region. The scope is not only basic ecological research on terrestrial and aquatic populations, communities, ecosystems and landscapes but also applied issues such as data science and climate change based on ecological research.

iii. Readership

For those who study basic ecological studies of terrestrial and aquatic populations, communities, ecosystems and landscapes, as well as those who study applied ecology such as climate change and data science based on ecological studies. Its readership can be expanded to other positions: • Researchers can obtain the latest topics in domestic and international ecological research; • Professors can access and adopt a variety of data for education; • Students can understand the latest trends in ecological research at home and abroad; • Policy makers can reflect the results of the papers in international ecological research policies.

iv. Duplicate submission and redundant publication

Submitted manuscripts must not have been previously published or be under consideration for publication elsewhere. No part of the accepted manuscript should be duplicated in any other scientific journal without the permission of the Editorial Board. Submitted manuscripts are screened for possible plagiarism or duplicate publication by iThenticate upon arrival. If plagiarism or duplicate publication related to the papers of this journal is detected, the manuscripts may be rejected, the authors will be announced in the journal, and their institutions will be informed. There will also be penalties for the authors.

A letter of permission is required for any and all material that has been published previously. It is the responsibility of the author to request permission from the publisher for any material that is being reproduced. This requirement applies to text, figures, and tables.

v. Authorship criteria

Authorship credit should be based on 1) substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; 2) drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; 3) final approval of the version to be published; and 4) agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. Every author should meet all of these four conditions. After the initial submission of a manuscript, any changes whatsoever in authorship (adding author(s), deleting author(s), or rearranging the order of authors) must be explained by a letter to the editor from the authors concerned. This letter must be signed by all authors of the paper. Copyright assignment must also be completed by every author.

vi. Corresponding author and first author

PNIE does not allow multiple corresponding authors for one article. Only one author should correspond with the editorial office and readers for one article. PNIE does accept notice of equal contribution for the first author when the study was clearly performed by co-first authors. Correction of authorship after publication: PNIE does not correct authorship after publication unless a mistake has been made by the editorial staff. Authorship may be changed before publication but after submission when an authorship correction is requested by all of the authors involved with the manuscript.

vii. pISSN: 2765-2203, eISSN: 2765-2211

3. Publishing Schedule

PNIE is published quarterly in a year (February 1, May 1, August 1, November 1). Supplement issues may be published.

4. Archiving

It is accessible without barrier from KoreaScience (https://koreascience.or.kr/) or National Library of Korea (http://nl.go.kr) in the event a journal is no longer published.

5. Copyright

All published papers become the permanent property of the National Institute of Ecology. Copyrights of all published materials are owned by the National Institute of Ecology. Every author should sign the copyright transfer agreement forms.

6. Licensing

This is an open-access journal distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-com-mercial license, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited for non-commercial purpose (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

Deposit policy: According to the deposit policy (self-archiving policy) of Sherpa/Romeo (http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/), authors cannot archive pre-print (i.e. pre-refereeing), but they can archive post-print (i.e. final draft post-refereeing). Authors can archive publisher's version/PDF.

7. Publication Ethics and Related Editorial Policies

i. Journal policies on authorship and contributorship

Authorship credit should be based on 1) substantial contributions to the conception or design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; 2) drafting the work or revising it critically for important intellectual content; 3) final approval of the version to be published; and 4) agreement to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. Authors should meet conditions of 1, 2, 3, and 4. After the initial submission of a manuscript, any changes whatsoever in authorship (adding author(s), deleting author(s), or rearranging the order of authors) must be explained by a letter to the editor from the authors concerned. This letter must be signed by all authors of the paper. Copyright assignment must also be completed by every author.

Corresponding author and first author: PNIE does not allow multiple corresponding authors for one article. Only one author should correspond with the editorial office and readers for one article. PNIE does accept notice of equal contribution for the first author when the study was clearly performed by co-first authors.

Correction of authorship after publication: PNIE does not correct authorship after publication unless a mistake has been made by the editorial staff. Authorship may be changed before publication but after submission when an authorship correction is requested by all of the authors involved with the manuscript.

ii. How the journal will handle complaints and appeals

The policy of the journal is primarily aimed at protecting the authors, reviewers, editors, and the publisher of the journal. If not described below, the process of handling complaints and appeals follows the guidelines of the Committee of Publication Ethics available from: https://publicationethics.org/appeals

iii. How the journal will handle allegations of research misconduct

When the journal faces suspected cases of research and publication misconduct such as redundant (duplicate) publication, plagiarism, fraudulent or fabricated data, changes in authorship, an undisclosed conflict of interest, ethical problems with a submitted manuscript, a reviewer who has appropriated an author’s idea or data, complaints against editors, and so on, the resolution process will follow the flowchart provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE; http://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts). The discussion and decision on the suspected cases are carried out by the PNIE Editorial Board and Research Ethics Committee of the National Institute of Ecology (https://www.nie.re.kr/nie/main/contents.do?menuNo=200189). If any individuals or institutions want to inform the cases, they can send a National Institute of Ecology Research Misconduct Report Center (https://www.nie.re.kr/nie/main/contents.do?menuNo=200189) and letter to editor For the complaints or appeals, concrete data with answers to all factual questions (who, when, where, what, how, why) should be provided.

iv. Journal policies on conflicts of interest/competing interests

The corresponding author must inform the editor of any potential conflicts of interest that could influence the author’s interpretation of the data. Examples of potential conflicts of interest are financial support from or connections to pharmaceutical companies, and academically related issues. In particular, all sources of funding applicable to the study should be explicitly stated.

v. Journal's policies on data sharing and reproducibility

The journal encourages authors to share the data and other artefacts supporting the results in the paper by archiving it in an appropriate public repository. Authors should include a data accessibility statement, including a link to the repository they have used, in order that this statement can be published alongside their paper. This journal follows the data sharing policy described in “Data Sharing Statements for Clinical Trials: A Requirement of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors”. The ICMJE's policy regarding trial registration is explained at https://www.icmje.org/recommendations/browse/publishing-and-editorial-issues/clinical-trial-registration.html. If the data sharing plan changes after registration this should be reflected in the statement submit-ted and published with the manuscript, and updated in the registry record.

It is possible to republish manuscripts if the manuscripts satisfy the conditions of secondary publication of the ICMJE Recommendations (http://www.icmje.org/urm_main.html).

vi. Journal's policy on ethical oversight

The Editorial Board will continuously work to monitor and safeguard publication ethics: guidelines for retracting articles; maintenance of the integrity of the academic record; preclusion of business needs from compromising intellectual and ethical standards; publishing corrections, clarifications, retractions, and apologies when needed; and excluding plagiarism and fraudulent data. The editors maintain the following responsibilities: responsibility and authority to reject and accept articles; avoiding any conflict of interest with respect to articles they reject or accept; promoting publication of corrections or retractions when errors are found; and preservation of the anonymity of reviewers.

vii. Journal's policy on intellectual property

The authors of the article hereby agree that the National Institute of Ecology holds the copyright on all submitted materials upon acceptance of the manuscript and the right to publish, transmit, sell, and distribute them in the journal or other media.

viii. Journal's policies on corrections and retractions

Cases that require editorial expressions of concern or retraction shall follow the COPE flowcharts available from: http://publicationethics.org/resources/flowcharts. If correction needs, it will follow the ICMJE Recommendation for Corrections, Retractions, Republications and Version Control available from: http://www.icmje.org/recommen-dations/browse/publishing-and-editorial-issues/corrections-and-version-control.html as follows: Honest errors are a part of science and publishing and require publication of a correction when they are detected. Corrections are needed for errors of fact. Minimum standards are as follows: First, it shall publish a correction notice as soon as possible detailing changes from and citing the original publication on both an electronic and numbered print page that is included in an electronic or a print Table of Contents to ensure proper indexing; Second, it shall post a new article version with details of the changes from the original version and the date(s) on which the changes were made through K-Mark; Third, it shall archive all prior versions of the article. This archive can be either directly accessible to readers; and Fourth, previous electronic versions shall prominently note that there are more recent versions of the article via K-Mark.

8. Peer Review Process

PNIE reviews all manuscripts received. A manuscript is first reviewed for its format and adherence to the aims and scope of the journal. PNIE is a peer-reviewed (single-blind peer review) journal and the manuscripts are reviewed by two referees with abundant research experience in the relevant fields of the submitted manuscript, and the final editorial decision is made by the Editorial Committee, based on the referees evaluations. After reviewing, the manuscript is returned to the corresponding author for revision, the revised manuscript must be re-submitted within one month. If it is not submitted within the designated period without any special reasons, such manuscript is deemed to be withdrawn from evaluation voluntarily.

9. Access

This is an open access journal distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

10. Ownership and Management

i. Information about the ownership: This journal is owned by the publisher, the National Institute of Ecology of the Republic of Korean (https://www.nie.re.kr/).

ii. Management team of a journal (https://pnie.accesson.kr/menu/46/48/)

- Journal management team (2020–2025)

- Journal Manager: Ohseok KWON, Kyungpook National University, Korea

- Manager of the Review Process: Ohseok KWON, Kyungpook National University, Korea

- Manuscript Editor: Ji Hi JUNG, MEDrang Inc., Korea

- Layout Editor: Suok JOH, MEDrang Inc., Korea

- Website and JATS XML File Producers: Gowoon BAE, Inforrang, Korea

- Ethics Manager: YoungJun PARK, National Institute of Ecology, Korea

- Administrative Manager: YoungJun PARK, Eunok LEE, Younmi RYU, National Institute of Ecology, Korea

11. Governing Body

The governing body is the journal's editorial board.

12. Editorial Team and Contact Information

i. Editorial team: https://pnie.accesson.kr/menu/46/48/

ii. Contact information

Administrative Manager: YoungJun Park, Eunok Lee, Younmi Ryu

1210, Geumgang-ro, Maseo-myeon, Seocheon-gun, Chungcheongnam-do, 33657, Korea

E-mail: pnie@nie.re.kr

13. Author Fees

To submit and publish a manuscript, PNIE assesses charges by stages as following:

1) Submission: no charges

2) Review: 20 USD is charged for the review process (waived until December 31, 2023)

3) Publication:

(1) Publication fee of NIE researchers: USD 500

(2) Publication fee of non-NIE researchers: USD 1,000

Publication fee is waived until December 31, 2023

14. Other Revenue

Submissions, reviews and publication fees are waived until December 31, 2023.

Revenue sources of journal were from the support of publisher (National Institute of Ecology), Korea Government’s support.

15. Advertising

PNIE accepts advertisements on the following basis:

i. Eligibility of the advertised products or services

All products or services should be safe and reliable, and not cause any harm to the health and welfare of humans. Advertisements may promote information and technologies relevant for authors, editors, reviewers, and readers. Pharmaceutical products may also be considered.

- Advertising is separate from content. Advertisers and sponsors have no advance knowledge of our editorial contents, nor do the editors have advance knowledge of advertisers. Content is never altered, added, or deleted to accommodate advertising. Advertisers and sponsors have no input regarding any of our editorial decisions or advertising policies.

- We reserves the right to decline or cancel any advertisement at any time.

- Advertisements for pharmaceutical products must conform to all regulations and policies of the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, Republic of Korea in every respect.

ii. Orders

Any individuals or organizations who are interested in advertising their products or services in the print copies of the journal or on its website are encouraged to contact the editorial office. The acceptance of advertisement will be discussed by the editorial board and will be ultimately approved by the publisher.

iii. Advertisement fee

For one print copy issue, the advertisement price for one whole page is USD 500 (or KRW 500,000). If the advertisement is half a page, the price is reduced by half. For a quarter of the page, this price is reduced by one quarter. For banner advertisements on the website, the price is negotiable according to the duration of its exposure on the journal homepage. The price is usually greater than that for print copies. However, it is free until December 31, 2023.

iv. Disclaimer

Liability: Neither the publisher nor the editors will be legally liable for advertisements presented in the journal. In addition, they cannot guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of the information provided. Endorsement: The publisher and the editors do not endorse any products or services that are advertised.

Disclaimer: Neither the publisher nor the authors will be legally liable for any of the content of advertisements, so readers must keep this in mind when reading or seeing advertisements.

16. Direct Marketing

Journal propagation has been done through the journal web site and distribution of an introduction pamphlet. Invitations to submit a manuscript are usually focused on the presenters at conferences, seminars, or workshops if the topic is related to the journal's aims and scope.