Summary of the 1st Editorial Committee Meeting of Journal of Palaeogeography in 2015

The 1stEditorial Committee Meeting of the Journal of Palaeogeography (JoP) in 2015 was held on March 20th, 2015 at the China University of Geosciences (Beijing), China. Prof. Zhi?Dong Bao,the Associate?Editor?in?Chief of the Editorial Committee, chaired the meeting, Ms. Yuan Wang, the Associate-Editor-in-Chief of the Editorial Office, gave a work report, and Prof. Zeng-Zhao Feng, the Editor?in?Chief of the Editorial Committee, gave an important address.

This meeting was mainly towards the Editorial Committee members from Beijing, and all these 15 members or their representatives attended this meeting, i.e., Profs. Zeng?Zhao Feng, Zhi?Dong Bao,Zhen?Kui Jin, and Xiao?Min Zhu, from China University of Petroleum (Beijing), Prof. Long?Yi Shao from China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing), Profs. Wen?Hui Huang, Zai?Xing Jiang,Ming?Xiang Mei, Xiao?Ying Shi (represented by Dong?Jie Tang), Xing?He Yu and Associate Prof.Hao Liu, from China University of Geosciences (Beijing), Prof. Jian?Bo Liu (represented by Jin?Zhuang Xue) and Associate Prof. Bao?Qi Huang (represented by Na Wang) from Peking University,Researcher De?Chen Su from Institute of Geology, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, and Researcher Ya?Sheng Wu (represented by Li?Jing Liu) from the Institute of Geology and Geophysics,Chinese Academy of Sciences. Besides, the meeting attendees also include Editorial Office staff, i.e.,Yuan Wang, Xiu?Juan Zheng, Min Liu and Xiu?Fang Hu, as well as Ms. Lei Yang, the Vice Director of Journal Department, China University of Petroleum (Beijing). As it was only a half?day meeting,domestic Editorial Committee members out of Beijing were not required to attend, however, most of them had sent their regards to a success of this meeting.

Meeting mainly includes the following aspects, and has taken constructive discussion.

1. Major progress of JoP recently. A statistics report of the published papers and their authors dis?tribution was presented during the meeting, which reflects the problem of manuscript sources. At present, JoP is still far away from enough high?level academic manuscripts. Hence, Prof. Zeng?Zhao Feng requires each member to write or recommend one high?level academic manuscript per year, es?pecially for those who have never published their papers on JoP, must submit one manuscript this year.

2. Cooperation with the international publisher Elsevier. A three?year contract (2015-2017) based on Open Access publishing JoP has been signed between China University of Petroleum (Beijing)and Elsevier. And the publishing system and the editorial system are being under construction, which will be ready for use in this July. By then, all the published papers of JoP since its launch can be freely downloaded from Science Direct.

3. Updated feedback from SCI office in indexing JoP. It is replied that JoP is still under its evalu?ation. JoP meets many of the criteria as indicated in the journal evaluation essay, such as publishing on time, international bibliographic standards, and international editorial advisory board, however,the journal’s citation impact is still rather low which is not unusual for a young journal. We believe,the Open Access publishing process will definitely promote the development of JoP.

4. Progress of major international conferences in 2015. (1) JoP is actively participating in the three conferences, i.e., the 2ndInternational Palaeogeography Conference (IPC) (October 10-13, Beijing,China), the 31stIAS Meeting of Sedimentology (IMS) (June 22-25, Kraków, Poland), and the GSA 2015 Annual Meeting (November 1-4, Baltimore, USA). Next year, we may consider to participate in the AAPG Annual Meeting. (2) Prof. Long?Yi Shao, on behalf of the organizer China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing), announced the preparation progress for the 2ndIPC. At present, it has been put on record to the Ministry of Education of PRC. China University of Petroleum (Beijing)promised to sponsor 100’000 CHY. Tens of overseas members have confirmed to attend this confer?ence. (3) Profs. Fotini A. Pomoni and Tadeusz Peryt will try their best to solicit manuscripts from the 31stIMS. (4) As a sponsor, JoP has successfully applied a session of “Palaeogeography” in the GSA 2015 Annual Meeting. Similarly to the International Sedimentological Congress 2014 in Geneva, this time, Profs. Adam D. Woods and Wan Yang will be fully in charge of journal propaganda and manu?script soliciting during meeting.

5. Due to the ineffective response from the Ministry of Education of PRC, for the application of establishing International Society of Palaeogeography, Prof. Zeng?Zhao Feng is composing a letter to the Minister of Ministry of Education of PRC. Hope this letter will promote the progress. The attend?ees carefully read and discussed through this letter during the meeting and had given their important suggestions.