Editorial Policy and Ethics

Publication Ethics and Publication Malpractice Statement
Journal of Science and Inclusive Development (JSID) fully endorses and applies the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) to administer matter of ethics.
Editorial ethics
JSID operate within COPE guidelines and work within all relevant legal and ethical frameworks and will work closely with editors to ensure that papers are dealt with fairly. This would play a vital role in maintaining and improving the quality of work the journal publishes and the integrity of its peer review and publication process. https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines/principles-transparency-and-best-practice-scholarly-publishing

Peer review
JSID undergo thorough peer review and endorse COPE guidelines for reviewers. https://publicationethics.org/resources/guidelines/cope-ethical-guidelines-peer-reviewers
The Journal operate double-blind peer review model. A minimum of two independent reviewers is normally required for every research article. It is a requirement to maintain confidentiality and integrity of the peer review and editorial decision-making process at all stages, complying with data protection regulations. The invited reviewer should declare any competing interest before submitting their report to the journal. The details of the comments as well as the overall recommendations by peer reviewers will be considered by the Editor when making a decision, but ultimate responsibility for acceptance or rejection lies with the Editor in chief.

Misconduct
JSID takes all forms of misconduct seriously and will take all necessary action, in accordance with COPE guidelines (https://publicationethics.org/misconduct), to protect the integrity of the scholarly record.
Examples of misconduct include (but are not limited to):
Affiliation misrepresentation, Breaches in copyright/use of third-party material without appropriate permissions, Citation manipulation, Duplicate submission/publication, “Ethics dumping”, Image or data manipulation/fabrication, Plagiarism, and Unethical research.

Research ethics and consent

All research published in JSID must have been conducted according to international and local guidelines ensuring ethically conducted research.
Research involving humans and animals
All research studies on humans (individuals, samples or data) must have been performed in accordance with the principles stated in the Declaration of

Helsinki. https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki-ethical-principles-for-medical-research-involving-human-subjects/
All submissions describing clinical research and/or research on human subjects will be checked to ensure the requirements. Clinical trials are subject to all policies regarding human research and study protocol (approved by the ethics committee). Clinical investigations must be conducted according to the principles (The Code of Ethics of the World Medical Association) expressed in the Declaration of Helsinki.

Prior to starting the study, ethical approval must have been obtained for all protocols from the local institutional review board (IRB) or other appropriate ethics committee to confirm the study meets national and international guidelines for research on humans. A statement to confirm this must be included within the manuscript, which must provide details of the name of the ethics committee and reference/permit numbers where available.

Appropriate consents, permissions and releases must be obtained where an author wishes to include case details or other personal information or images of patients and any other individuals.

Studies involving vertebrates or regulated invertebrates (e.g. cephalopods), field studies and other non-experimental research on animals must have been carried out based Research procedures must be carried out in accordance with applicable national or international guidelines. All animal experiments should comply with the ARRIVE guidelines https://www.nc3rs.org.uk/arrive-guidelines and should be carried out in accordance with the U.S. Public Health Service Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals and, as applicable, the Animal Welfare Act https://olaw.nih.gov/sites/default/files/PHSPolicyLabAnimals.pdf

Declaration of competing interests
All authors should disclose in their manuscript any financial and personal relationships with other people or organisations that could be viewed as inappropriately influencing (bias) their work.  All participants (editors, reviewers) in the peer review and publication process must also disclose all relationships that could be viewed as presenting a potential conflict of interest

Complaints and appeals
Anyone may inform the Editor-in-Chief at any time of suspected unethical behavior or any type of misconduct by giving the necessary credible information/evidence to start an investigation. When dealing with unethical behavior, the Editorial Board will rely on the guidelines and recommendations provided by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).

Authorship criteria
All authors must meet the criteria for authorship, which include the role of the author in conception of the study, design of the study, data collection, data analysis, and write up of the manuscript. Those who contributed to the work but do not meet the criteria for authorship can be mentioned in the Acknowledgments.

Archiving and repository policy
The journal is committed to the permanent availability and preservation of scholarly research and to ensure accessibility.
Authors are permitted to deposit the publisher's version (PDF) of their work in an institutional repository or other repository of their choice.

Article Processing Charges
JSID publishes all accepted manuscripts without any article processing charges. The publication cost is covered by Wolaita Sodo University

Copyright and Licensing:
JSID is an Open Access Journal where readers have accesses to full text for free. Authors must agree that published article to be distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY NC ND 4.0, which permits readers to share all or part of your article in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes. Journal allows authors to retain the copyright of their papers without restrictions. Authors will then grant the publisher the right of first publication, and other non-exclusive publishing rights.

Retractions, and corrections
Legal limitations of the publisher, copyright holder or author(s), infringements of professional ethical codes, such as multiple submissions, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or any major misconduct require retraction of an article according to Retraction guidelines | COPE: Committee on Publication Ethics. https://publicationethics.org/node/19896 Occasionally, a retraction can be used to correct numerous serious errors, which cannot be covered by publishing corrections.

JSID will retract an article if the editors determine that issues that are not resolved in our discussions with the authors warrant retraction per COPE guidance. When retracting an article, JSID publishes a notice of retraction that explains the reason(s) for the retraction. The notice is posted at the top of the affected article’s JSID webpage and is linked to the article’s publication record. At the time of retraction, we update the downloadable PDF that is available at the article’s JSID webpage, so that for subsequent downloads the retracted status is clearly noted on the PDF.

We may publish corrections to address errors in JSID articles if, per our editorial assessment, all of the following criteria have been met: the errors impact the main contents or understanding of the article; the article's overall results and conclusions are upheld and there are no concerns about the integrity or reliability of the reported work. JSID may also publish a correction to address an error that affects key aspects of the publication’s metadata (e.g., misspelling of an author's name, or errors in the competing interests, funding, or data availability statement). When we republish an article, we generally publish an accompanying correction notice that is linked to the article and documents the changes.