Author Guidelines

INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS

The Forests and Forest Products Society (FFPS) publishes the Forests and Forest Product Journal (FFPJ), a venue dedicated to original, field-based and production-oriented research alongside review articles spanning Forestry, Wood Technology, Ecology, Wildlife, Environmental Science, Non-Timber Forest Products, and related disciplines. Every manuscript received by FFPJ goes through peer review by no fewer than two subject-area experts. Beginning in 2026, the journal moves to a biannual publication schedule.

Manuscript Submission

The journal welcomes original research manuscripts. In addition, review manuscripts, monographs and short communications are invited. Submission of a manuscript to FFPJ implies that the work has never been published and that it is not under consideration for publication in any form elsewhere. Manuscripts must be approved by all co-authors (where applicable) prior to submission.

Plagiarism Policy

The journal is strictly against plagiarism in any form. Plagiarism is the unethical act of copying ideas, methods, results or words without acknowledging the original author and source. The common types of plagiarism are: full plagiarism, partial plagiarism and self-plagiarism. Self-plagiarism occurs when an author utilizes a large part of his/her own previously published work without using appropriate references.

Thus, author(s) should ensure that their work is entirely original. Where authors have used the work and/or words of others, the author(s) should be appropriately cited. Before submission to FFPJ, author(s) should check their manuscript(s) for plagiarism using appropriate software. All manuscripts submitted for publication to FFPJ are independently cross-checked for plagiarism. A manuscript is considered to breach this policy if its similarity score against previously published work exceeds 20 percent, or if its AI-generated-content score exceeds 5 percent. FFPJ accepts no legal liability for any resulting claims of copyright infringement or plagiarism.

Manuscript Submission Overview
Types of Publications

• Article: These are original research manuscripts. It contributes a meaningful body of new findings, supported by references that reflect the most current and relevant literature in the field. Its structure should comprise an Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, Materials and Methods/Methodology, Results, Discussion, and Conclusions and or recommendation (optional) sections
• Review: A review article synthesises the existing body of literature in a given field, identifying current gaps or problems. It should combine critical analysis with constructive suggestions, while providing recommendations for future research. It must not introduce new, unpublished data. Its structure may include an Abstract, Keywords, Introduction, appropriately named topical sections, Discussion, Conclusions, and a Future Directions section.

Submission Process

Manuscripts for FFPJ should be submitted online at https://www.ffps.org.ng/journal/. The submitting author, typically the corresponding author, is responsible for the manuscript during the submission and peer review process. The submitting author must ensure that all eligible co-authors have been included in the author list and that they have all read and approved the submitted version of the manuscript. To submit your manuscript, register and log in to the submission website. All co-authors will be notified of the submission.

Accepted File Format

Manuscripts should preferably be prepared in Microsoft Word, and the combined size of all submitted files must stay within 100 MB.

Manuscript Preparation

Manuscripts submitted to FFPJ should be prepared in accordance with the specified guidelines. All portions of the manuscript should be typewritten with double spacing and wide margins (2.54 cm on all sides). Use a normal, plain font (12-point Times Roman) for typing texts. Page numbers should run consecutively from the first to the last page. Apart from scientific names of plants and/or animals, italics should only be used for emphasis (where necessary). Use the equation editor or MathType to write equations and the table function of a Word processor to draw Tables.

Title Page

Manuscript title should be concise, specific and informative, with appropriate words for indexing and information retrieval. The title should not be lengthy, it should be maximum of 21 words or less. The title page should contain the name(s) of authors, their affiliations and email address(es). The correspondent author should be clearly indicated.

Abstract

The abstract should be a brief summary of the entire work following the logic of a structured. The abstract should be a single paragraph and should follow the style of structured abstracts, but without headings: (1) background/justification/status of knowledge/knowledge gap, (2) Methods: description of the main methods or treatments applied, (3) Results: summary of the article's main findings; and 4) Conclusion: main conclusions or interpretations. The abstract should be an objective representation of the article. It must not contain results which are not presented and substantiated in the main text and should not exaggerate the main conclusions. The length of the abstract should not be more than 250 words. Following the abstract, 5 to 8 related keywords, that will be used for indexing purpose, should be provided.

Manuscript Sections

The main body of manuscript submitted to FFPJ should be divided into the following sections: Introduction, Methodology (Materials and Methods), Results, Discussion, Conclusions, Recommendations, Acknowledgments (if any) References, Appendices (if any).

• Introduction: The introduction should briefly place the study in a broad context and highlight why it is important. It should define the purpose of the work and its significance, including specific hypotheses being tested. The current state of the research field should be reviewed carefully and key publications cited. Please highlight controversial and diverging hypotheses when necessary. Finally, briefly mention the main aim of the work and highlight the main conclusions. Keep the introduction comprehensible to scientists working outside the topic of the paper.
• ntroduction:Materials and Methods: They should be described with sufficient detail to allow others to replicate and build on published results. New methods and protocols should be described in detail, while well-established methods can be briefly described and appropriately cited. Give the name and version of any software. Where applicable, authors are required to disclose in this section details of how GenAI has been used in the paper (e.g., to generate text, data or graphics or assist in study design or data collection, analysis or interpretation).
• Results: Provide a concise and precise description of the experimental results, along with their interpretation as well as conclusions.
• Discussion: Authors should discuss the results and how they can be interpreted in perspective of previous studies and of the working hypotheses. The findings and their implications should be discussed in the widest context possible and limitations of the work highlighted. This section may be combined with Results.
• Conclusions: Authors should conclude the results of their research here. This section is mandatory for research papers.
• Tables and Figures: should be numbered consecutively in Arabic characters throughout the manuscript and must be cited at appropriate sections within the text. Each Table and Figure should be placed at the approximate location where author wants it to appear when the manuscript is published. Same data should not be presented in Table and Figure. All figures should be of a high quality (preferably no less than 600 dpi) in PNG, JPEG or TIFF formats. All table columns should have an explanatory heading. Authors should use the “Table” option in Microsoft Word to create tables.
• Acronyms/Abbreviations/Initialisms: should be defined the first time they appear in each of three sections: the abstract; the main text; the first figure or table. When defined for the first time, the acronym/abbreviation/initialism should be added in parentheses after the written-out form.
• SI Units: (International System of Units) should be used. Imperial, US customary and other units should be converted to SI units whenever possible.
• Equations: Use either the Microsoft Equation Editor or the MathType add-on. Equations should be editable by the editorial office and not appear in a picture format.

The list of ALL references cited within the text must be listed on the “References” section. All cited references must have been published or accepted for publication. Citation within the manuscript should follow this style: single authored paper: Omole (2010); two-authored paper: Abwage and Ogana (2019) and multiple authored paper: Maru et al., (2023). Reference list entries should be arranged alphabetically and chronologically by the last names of the first author of each publication. Reference list entries should be as follows

Journal publication

Omole, A. O. (2010). Effects of wood properties on incidental damages to felled trees in some selected Nigerian hardwood species. Nigerian Journal of Forestry 40(1), 17-25.

Abwage, W. D. and Ogana, F. N. (2019). Effects of Plot Dimension on Weibull Parameters. Forests and Forest Products Journal 19, 73-79

Maru, Y., Gebrekirstos, A. and Haile, G. (2023). Indigenous sacred forests as a tool for climate change mitigation: lessons from Gedeo community, southern Ethiopia. Journal of Sustainable Forestry, 42(3), 260-287

Text Books

Keay, R. W. J. (1989). Trees of Nigeria. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 476 pp.

Edited books or conference proceedings

Areo O.S., Omole A.O, Amoo-Onidundun O.N., Falemara B.C, Adejoba A.L, and Omole A.M. (2025). Challenges in Local Production of Industrial Adhesives: A Review of Nigerian SMEs. In Idumah, F.O., Oyun, M.B., Alo-Akintunde, D and Falemara, B.C. (Eds). Healthy and Resilient Forests for a Buoyant Nigerian Economy: Proceedings of the 9th Biennial Conference of the Forests and Forest Products Society. 21 - 24 October, 2025. Akure: 653-666pp

How to submit individual papers

Manuscript should be submitted online through the journal website (https://www.ffps.org.ng/journal/). On the website, click on register as an author if you are a first-time user of the platform. Upon successful registration, login and then follow instructions to submit your manuscript. However, if you have earlier registered as an author, proceed to login and then follow the instructions to submit your manuscript. Authors are to forward evidence of payment for reviewer/publication fees by email to: jconyekwelu@futa.edu.ng; editor@ffps.org.ng; ffpsociety@gmail.com

Peer Review and the Editorial Procedure

All manuscripts including research and review articles published in our journals are subjected to thorough peer-reviewed by experts. As soon as a submission comes in, the Editorial team is notified and invited to perform a technical pre-check of the manuscript’s suitability. The Editorial Office coordinates the peer review process, performed by independent experts and collects at least two review reports per manuscript. Once peer review is completed, authors can log into the journal portal to see content of the reviewer reports. Authors are then requested to revise the manuscript adequately (with a second round of peer review if necessary) before a final decision is made. The final decision is made by the Editor team (usually the Editor-in-Chief/Editorial Board Member or the Guest Editor of a Special Issue). Accepted articles undergo copy-editing prior to final online publication.

Editorial Decision and Revision

• Accept in Present Form: The paper is accepted without any further changes.
• Accept after Minor Revision: The paper will be accepted after the authors revise based on the reviewers’ comments. Authors are given seven days for minor revision.
• Accept after Major Revision: The acceptance of a resubmitted manuscript depends on the revision. The authors need to provide a point-by-point response or rebuttal if some revisions based on the reviewers’ comments cannot be made. A maximum of two rounds of major revision per manuscript is normally provided. Authors will be asked to resubmit the revised paper within ten days, and the revised version will be returned to the reviewers for further comments.
• Reject: An article containing serious errors and making no original contribution will be rejected, with no offer of resubmission to the journal.

Open Access Policy

Manuscripts accepted for publication in FFPJ are published online on the journal’s website (https://www.ffps.org.ng/journal/), and are made freely available to a wide audience. Thus, full text of all articles published in FFPJ can be downloaded free of charge. This gives each article high visibility and accessibility. Currently, hard copies of the journal are not being printed.

Publication charge

Upon submission of manuscript, the author is expected to pay a non-refundable manuscript assessment fee of N10,000.00 (15 USD) per manuscript. Author(s) of accepted manuscript(s) will pay publication charge of N15,000.00 (25 USD) per manuscript. Assessment and publication charges are subject to change and authors will be notified accordingly.