Editorial Ethics and Good Practice

Reference framework

Guarracuco Sostenible takes as its reference the guidelines of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and the authorship criteria of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE), insofar as they apply to the disciplines the journal covers.

Duties of the editorial team

  • Decide on publication solely on the basis of the academic merit of the manuscript, regardless of the authors' institution, nationality, gender, political views or career.
  • Keep manuscripts and the identity of authors and reviewers confidential.
  • Refrain from using in their own research any unpublished material they have seen in the course of their duties.
  • Step aside from the process when there is a conflict of interest and delegate the decision to another member of the editorial team.

Duties of authors

  • Submit original, unpublished work that is not under consideration elsewhere.
  • Cite all sources used fully and accurately.
  • Declare sources of funding and any conflicts of interest that could affect the interpretation of the results.
  • Keep the primary data and make them available to the editorial team on request.
  • Inform the editor immediately of any substantial error found in published work and cooperate in correcting it.

Authorship

Authorship belongs to those who have made a substantial contribution to the conception of the work, to data collection or analysis, and to drafting or critically revising the manuscript, and who have approved the final version. Others who took part are acknowledged in the acknowledgements. The journal recommends declaring contributions using the CRediT taxonomy. Changes to authorship after submission require the written agreement of all authors.

Generative artificial intelligence

Generative artificial intelligence tools cannot be authors, since they cannot take responsibility for the content. Authors who have used such tools for writing, analysis or image generation declare it in the methodology section or in a note, stating the tool and how it was used. Responsibility for the accuracy and originality of the text rests entirely with the authors.

Research involving humans and animals

Work involving human participants provides evidence of approval by the relevant ethics committee and of participants' informed consent. Work involving animals provides evidence of compliance with the applicable animal welfare regulations. The journal may request copies of the corresponding approvals.

Corrections, retractions and expressions of concern

The journal publishes an erratum when an error leaves the results intact, an expression of concern when there is a well-founded suspicion of misconduct not yet proven, and a retraction when plagiarism, data fabrication or falsification, duplicate publication or an error that invalidates the conclusions is established. The corresponding notice is linked both ways with the affected article, which remains accessible and is flagged on the site.

Complaints

Complaints about editorial conduct or the integrity of a publication are sent to editorial@unimeta.edu.co. The editorial team acknowledges receipt and handles them following the COPE flowcharts. When a complaint concerns the editor, it is sent to the General Secretariat of the Corporación Universitaria del Meta - UNIMETA at secretariageneral@unimeta.edu.co, which takes charge of it and decides.