Writeshops: An effective tool to enable African academics to publish

Abstract

Increased public awareness, and the concomitant growth in political commitment to mitigation and adaptation, has made the need for accurate and relevant communication of scientific information on climate change more pressing (Fischoff, 2011). Although much research takes place on the African continent, by African scholars or those based at African institutions, a limited amount of it finds its way into the peer-reviewed literature, which is the leading evidence base for policy and development practice, and is the dominant source of literature for major global assessments, such as the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment and IPCC Assessment Reports. In this paper we discuss some of the reasons for such a disproportionate representation, and present promising evidence for the utility of so-called writeshops as a platform for mentoring and supporting peer-reviewed publications by African scholars to improve the situation in the short term.