Instructions to Authors
Please note that the journal now encourages authors to complete their copyright license to publish form online. Please refer to the instructions in the "Welcome to Oxford Journals" email.
New submissions and resubmissions of revised manuscripts must be in PDF format. No other formats will be accepted.
Authors’ Identification and Title Page
To protect their anonymity in the review process AUTHORS SHOULD NOT IDENTIFY THEMSELVES ON THE TITLE PAGE OR IN ANY HEADERS. A SEPARATE TITLE PAGE MUST BE SENT AS AN ATTACHMENT TO THE EDITORS via the online submission management system and should include: (a) title; (b) author(s) names; and (c) name, address, phone and fax numbers, and email address of the author serving as the contact person.
Please assure that at least one sentence of text occurs between any two headings (in particular, a section heading should be followed by at least some text preceding any subsection heading). Double-space all material, including footnotes, references, and tables, on 8-1/2- by 11-inch standard-weight white paper. Use 1-1/4-inch margins and 12-point Times Roman or a similar type style. All headings and subheadings are flush left. Provide short headings for each section and subsection. Do not number sections or subsections. Section headings are denoted in bold and subsection headings, in italics. Do not indent the first paragraph after any heading. Do not use a heading prior to the first paragraph of the article (e.g., no heading for “introduction”), and do not indent the first paragraph of the article. All material should be double-spaced and single sided. Follow The Chicago Manual of Style, by the University of Chicago Press, and recent issues of the AJAE for style. NOTE: When referring to your paper, use the word “article.”
Manuscripts reporting the results of economic experiments or surveys conducted by the authors must include a copy of the experimental instructions or survey instrument as an appendix to be used by the Journal referees.
Please follow the Chicago Manual of Style, 16th ed.
Data and Documentation
Data sources should be indicated clearly in the article. Upon acceptance and in keeping with evolving policies at other top economics journals, authors are expected to submit their datasets and associated documentation (perhaps in a readme file), for readers to download from the AJAE website. Authors are also expected to provide whatever other material is needed to ensure that their results can be replicated (this might include code or pseudo-code used in estimation). Authors are encouraged to comply with all of this policy, but the editors would prefer partial compliance over non-compliance. The submitted files will be accessible as clickable links to the online version of the published paper. It is understood that in cases where the data are proprietary or confidential authors cannot fully satisfy this policy. Such cases should be brought to the attention of the editor at the time of initial submission.
Documentation of Research Involving Human Subjects
For all submitted manuscripts involving human subjects research conducted by one or more of the authors, the authors must communicate the following to the editors before the manuscript can be reviewed. (1) The authors have obtained approval from all appropriate Institutional Review Boards or equivalent institutional oversight authorities and (2) the data collection efforts do not involve deception of human subjects even if the protocol was approved by all appropriate Institutional Review Boards. If authors are uncertain whether their data collection procedure involved deception, please contact one of the editors.
Each author of a manuscript is required to submit a disclosure statement describing the sources of financial support the author has received. The form for the disclosure statement can be downloaded here.
If the paper involves several coauthors, each coauthor is required to submit a separate disclosure statement. The disclosure statement must be included even if the authors have nothing to disclose; this fact should be explicitly stated. Manuscripts submittedwithout the required disclosureforms will be returned to the authors. In order to preserve the double-blind review system, the disclosure statement will not be available to referees. AAEA’s disclosure policy can be found here.
Use only essential mathematical notation. Avoid using the same character for both superscripts and subscripts or using capital letters for such, and whenever possible avoid overbars, tildes, carets, and other modifications of standard type. Asterisks, primes, and small English letter superscripts are suitable.
Use standard type to the maximum extent possible (for example, use Symbol font for Greek characters in simple notation). Refrain from use of embellished letters (dots, bars, tildes, carets). Run equations into text if at all possible (rather than displaying). Simplify notation to avoid costly typesetting. All displayed equations (i.e., equations not run into regular text) should be numbered consecutively, placed in parentheses (not square brackets) and left-justified on the same line as the equal or inequality sign.
Footnotes to Text
Number footnotes consecutively throughout the article, not page by page. Type all footnotes, double-spaced, on a separate page following the article. Footnotes should be only explanatory and not for citations or for directing the reader to a particular work. Such information can be incorporated into the text. (Note: for accepted manuscripts, a leading unnumbered footnote providing authors’ affiliations and acknowledgements will be taken from the title page.)
References and Citations
Place References, alphabetized by author, in a list at the end of the paper, double spaced (without extra blank lines between references). Provide issue number whenever possible and always for journals that do not number pages sequentially through complete volumes (e.g., for Journal of Economic Perspectives). Format reference with hanging indentation (first line flush left, second and subsequent lines indented). Only cited works may be included in the reference list. All citations should appear in the text and contain the authors name and year, with page numbers when necessary; text citations should omit any comma or other punctuation between the author name and the year of publication. Citations can be inserted parenthetically, e.g. (Doe 1998, p. 5). If the author’s name is used as part of the sentence, include year of publication parenthetically, with page numbers if necessary; e.g., Doe, Smith and Jones (2002) show that . . . . . Use et al. only with four or more authors. For text citations listing more than one source, separate sources by a semi-colon: (Doe 1998; Smith and Jones 2000; Smith, Jones, and Erp 2003; Thomas et al. 2004). Do not use et al. in the reference section.
You can find examples of how to list specific types of references and citations in the AJAE Reference Guide.
Tables and Figures
Place each table and figure on a separate page at the end of the paper. Double-space all material and omit vertical rules in tables. Each table and figure must have a legend, i.e., title together with any narrative that the reader might find useful in understanding the content. Place legends for tables at the top of the table. Place legends for figures at the bottom of the figure. Table and figure titles should be fully descriptive, flush left, and bold. Omit a period at the end of the legend. For table legend, capitalize the first letter in each major word (but not prepositions that carry little information, as ‘in’, ‘and’, etc.). For figure legend, capitalize only the first letter of the first word together with proper nouns and adjectives. Examples:
Table 1. Summary Statistics for Pennsylvania Wheat Crops, 1998-2000
Figure 1. Annual net sales of Mississippi catfish farmers, 2002-2003
In-text Citation Style of Table or Figure
Use lowercase for the words “table” and “figure” in the text unless, of course, they appear at the beginning of a sentence.
Footnotes to Tables
Use lower case English letters to attach footnotes to specific items within the table, and place the footnotes below the bottom line of the table in (un-indented) paragraph form. For general explanatory notes, use the heading “Note:” and continue on the same line with the first word of the note, in paragraph form. The "Note:" paragraph may define the use of asterisk (e.g., * or **) to denote statistical significance levels. For example, say "Asterisk (*) and double asterisk (**) denote variables significant at 5% and 10% respectively." See a recent issue after January 2006 of the journal for other examples.
Footnotes to Figures
Normally figures do not carry footnotes to specific items within the figure. General explanatory information may be included in a paragraph bearing the heading of “Note:” and placed below the figure legend. See a recent issue of the journal for examples.
Place legends for figures at the bottom of the figure, flush left, and bold. Capitalize only the first letter of the first word. Example:
Figure 1. Annual net sales of Mississippi catfish farmers, 2002-2003
Figures can be reproduced in color in print at a cost of $600 per figure or in color online only (with a black and white print version) at no charge. Authors will be queried at the time of production for color charge cost approval. If, at the time of submission, the author knows that color online only is the preferred publication method, two figure files should be submitted: the black and white version should be labeled for print and the color version should be labeled online in the figure file name.
The AJAE posts supplementary appendix material for published articles on the Oxford University Press (OUP) website with the links to the supplementary material appearing adjacent to the link for the article to make availability to readers convenient and reliable. While authors may still maintain their own web-based supplements, any materials to which a published article would have previously referred as "available on request" will be posted online with a link next to the published article. Thus the article to be published in the AJAE should cite the online appendix rather than simply telling readers that supplementary materials are available upon request. Please see the instructions on how to prepare the supplementary appendices.
LANGUAGE EDITING PRE-SUBMISSION
OUP offers pre-submission language editing through Oxford Language Editing, a service for researchers all over the world. Language editing, particularly if English is not your first language, can be used to ensure that the academic content of your paper is fully understood by the journal editors and reviewers. Visit www.oxfordlanguageediting.com to find out more about the freelance editors available and the different services offered. Please note that edited manuscripts will still need to undergo peer-review by the journal.
American Journal of Agricultural Economics does not accept papers that have been previously published elsewhere with the exception of working papers series. The Journal’s policy regarding working paper series is:
1. Pre-publication in working paper series is allowed where submission to the working paper series is prior to acceptance by the Journal.
2. The working paper version may remain online after publication in the Journal.
3. The working paper version should NOT be updated after acceptance by the Journal.
4. Authors are requested to append the appropriate citation to the working paper version on acceptance by the Journal (if the working paper series allows this).
Submission of a paper will be held to imply that a) the material in the manuscript has not been published, is not being published or considered for publication elsewhere, and will not be submitted for publication elsewhere unless rejected by the journal editor or withdrawn by the author(s); b) the material in the manuscript, so far as the author(s) knows, does not infringe upon other published material covered by copyright; c) the author’s (s’) employer, if any, either does not assert an ownership interest in the manuscript or is willing to convey such interest to the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association (AAEA); and d) submission of the manuscript gives the AAEA exclusive right to publish, to copyright, and to allow or deny reproduction of it, in whole or in part. If the applicability of point a) is unclear, the author(s) must provide an explanation in the cover letter.
AUTHOR SELF-ARCHIVING/PUBLIC ACCESS POLICY
For information about this journal's policy, please visit our Author Self-Archiving policy page.
LICENSE TO PUBLISH
Upon receipt of accepted manuscripts at Oxford Journals authors will be invited to complete an online copyright license to publish form.
Please note that by submitting an article for publication you confirm that you are the corresponding/submitting author and that Oxford University Press ("OUP") may retain your email address for the purpose of communicating with you about the article. You agree to notify OUP immediately if your details change. If your article is accepted for publication, OUP will contact you using the email address you have used in the registration process. Please note that OUP does not retain copies of rejected articles.
OPEN ACCESS OPTION FOR AUTHORS
American Journal of Agricultural EconomicsAmerican Journal of Agricultural Economics authors have the option to publish their paper under the Oxford Open initiative; whereby, for a charge, their paper will be made freely available online immediately upon publication. After your manuscript is accepted the corresponding author will be required to accept a mandatory licence to publish agreement. As part of the licensing process you will be asked to indicate whether or not you wish to pay for open access. If you do not select the open access option, your paper will be published with standard subscription-based access and you will not be charged.
Oxford Open articles are published under Creative Commons licences. Authors publishing in can use the following Creative Commons licences for their articles:
• Creative Commons Non-Commercial licence (CC-BY-NC)
• Creative Commons non-Commercial No Derivatives licence (CC-BY-NC-ND)
Please click here for more information about the Creative Commons licences.
You can pay Open Access charges using our Author Services site. This will enable you to pay online with a credit/debit card, or request an invoice by email or post. The open access charges applicable are:
Regular charge - £1750/ $2800 / €2275
List B Developing country charge* - £875 / $1400 / €1135
List A Developing country charge* - £0 /$0 / €0
*Visit our Developing Countries page for a list of qualifying countries.
Published on behalf of
Impact factor: 1.363
5-Yr impact factor: 1.691
Brian E. Roe