Agricultural and Food Science Journal of Ghana
Journal / Agricultural and Food Science Journal of Ghana / Submissions

 

GENERAL: The Agricultural and Food Science Journal of Ghana publishes papers describing original research, observational or experimental and critical reviews in agriculture and food science.

Submission guidelines

All submissions should include the following separate files: Title Page; Manuscript; Tables; Figures; Captions for Tables and figures. To ensure anonymity in the review process, do not include names of the authors and their institutions in the Manuscript file. 

Covering letter. A covering letter must state that the manuscript is an original contribution, has not been published in substantially the same form, is not currently under consideration elsewhere, and that permission has been granted for any copyrighted material used.

Submission

An electronic copy of the manuscript should be submitted, in English (UK), with a font size of 10pt in Times New Roman, justified with vertical line numbers in double line spacing with at least 2.5 cm margins to: Editorial Secretariat, The Agricultural and Food Science Journal of Ghana, CSIR-Crops Research Institute, Ghana e-mail account afsjghana@cropsresearch.org or afsjghana@gmail.com All pages must be numbered consecutively in the bottom-centre.  English spelling should conform to The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English. Manuscript length must not exceed 7000 words. 

Manuscript Format 

The following format is designed for all papers but should be modified to suit particular circumstances.  The typescript should be arranged as follows, with each section beginning on a separate page:

• Title page

The following details must be given on the first sheet:

1. A short running title
2. The full title of the paper
3. The name(s) of the author(s) and their contact details (e-mail and postal addresses) at which the research was carried out. Authors names must be arranged with the initials first followed by the surname with full stop separating the initials e.g., S.K. Thompson, S.Y. Bilson, …
4. Details of the corresponding author. 

• Abstract

This should provide a concise statement of the scope of the work and principal findings including statistical techniques employed. The abstract should not exceed 250 words. The abstract should not contain any undefined abbreviations or unspecified references.

• No more than five keywords

This is to contain no more than 5 keywords or phrases to enable retrieval for indexing by modern searching techniques. The keywords should be separated by semi-colon (i.e. ;). Keywords should be arranged in alphabetical order and Scientific names should be italicized

Authors are mandated to provide their ORCIDs on the title page.

1. Introduction

 This should contain a clear statement of the reason for doing the work, outlining the essential background, and the research gap to be filled by your research, but should not include either the findings or the conclusions.

1. Materials and methods

This should provide sufficient details of the technique(s) used to allow them to be repeated.

1. Results

 This should only state the results as obtained, describing interesting trends with tables, graphs, etc.

1. Discussion

 This should highlight the significance of the results and place them in the context of other works.  The Results and Discussion sections may be combined if desired, but in this case, the final paragraph ought to provide a resume of the main conclusions.

Acknowledgments

 This should be a brief formal statement of gratitude to institutions and persons who contributed to the research. Persons who provided encouragement or moral support, non-scientific services are not appropriate for acknowledgment in a scientific paper. Where funding was provided, the name of the funding agency and funding number should be written out in full on the last page. 

Conflict of Interest

 Authors must declare all conflicts or potential conflicts of interest (or their absence) in the manuscript just before the references section.

1. Title Case

All titles and sub-titles must begin with an uppercase letter with the rest of the words in lowercase letters.

(g)  Illustrations

 Illustrations should be in colour photographs of excellent quality and should be well labeled and given figure numbers.

(h) Tables

 Each table should be numbered with Arabic numerals and accompanied by a title and explanatory caption at the top.  Tables should be provided as a separate file and should be cited in the text in consecutive numerical order.  The preferred locations of the tables should be indicated in the manuscript (e.g., Table 1 here). Data must either be presented in tabular or graphical form.  Illustrations and tables should be self-explanatory, without reference to the text or other tables and illustrations.  Footnotes to tables should be indicated by superscript lower-case letters (or asterisks for significance values and other statistical data) and included beneath the table body.

 (i) Figures

 Figures should be provided as a separate file and should be cited in the text in consecutive numerical order.  The preferred locations of the figures should be indicated in the manuscript (e.g., Figure 1 here). To add lettering, it is best to use Helvetica or Arial (sans serif fonts). Lettering size should be consistent throughout the final-sized artwork, usually about 2–3 mm (10 point). Figures must be presented in TIFF or EPS formats. 

(j) Legends

 All figure or table legends or captions must be numbered submitted in a separate file

(k) References

References in the text should use the Harvard System (i.e. author, year).  If there are more than two authors, et al. should be used throughout.  DOIs of referenced articles should be included in the bibliographic references. The reference list should be in alphabetical order and include the full title with the name of the journal given in full and italicised thus:

Journal Article: Example

Atkin, O.K., Botman, B. & Lambers, H. 1996. The relationship between the relative growth rate and nitrogen economy of alpine and lowland Poa species. Plant, Cell and Environment 19: 1324-1330.

Book Chapter: Example

Schjoerring, J. K. 1991.  Ammonia emission from the foliage of growing plants.  In Trace Gas Emissions by Plants (Eds. T.D. Sharkey, E.A. Holland & H.A. Mooney), pp. 267-292. Academic Press, San Diego.

Book: Example

Gaugh, Jr., H.G. 1992. Statistical Analysis of Regional Yield Trials. 2nd Edition Elsevier, Amsterdam.

Website: Example

University Library. 2016. University Library Home page, 26 February 2016, The University of Western Australia. Available from: http://www.library.uwa.edu.au. [31 March 2016].

Webpage: Example

Weida, S. & Stolley, K. 2013. Developing strong thesis statements. Available from: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/588/1/. [13 October 2015]. 

(l) Units: Authors are required to use the International System of Units (S.L., Systẻme International d’Unitẻs) for exact measures of physical quantities.

(m) Scientific names: The complete scientific name (genus, species, authority and cultivar, if appropriate) should be cited for every organism when first mentioned.  Subsequently, the generic name may be abbreviated to initials except where intervening references to other genera would cause confusion.  Common names of organisms, if used should be accompanied by the correct scientific name on the first mention.  Latin names should be italicised.

(n) Abbreviations

 Chemical symbols may be used in the text, together with the widely accepted abbreviations of longer chemical terms.  Other abbreviations may also be used but the full term should be given on the first mention.

(o) Data Storage

 The author is required to deposit the data for the manuscript in a secured Open Access repository. 

 

For further information: afsjghana@cropsresearch.org,  afsjghana@gmail.com

Website: www.cropsresearch.org

Rev. Raphael Kwame Bam (PhD): r.bam@cropsresearch.org  or ralphbam@gmail.com

The Director, CSIR-CRI, cridirector@cropsresearch.org

Tel. +233-0322060391/+233-0208173536/0244533482