The journal gap

A few months ago this year, the Higher Education Commission (HEC) of Pakistan released a list of 355 national journals along with the categorisation of international journals for academics across the country, applicable from April 1, 2026 to December 31, 2027.

The journals listed, however, are venues for academics to publish their research, which is acceptable for many academic benefits – promotions, appointments, incentives, increased research grants and fellowship opportunities, among others. The current list of approved national journals, compared with the previous list, reflects the HEC’s praiseworthy efforts this time by shortlisting journals from two important perspectives.

First, most of the journals (203) on the list are associated with national universities, indicating that the HEC has encouraged universities nationwide to strengthen their research culture. Fascinatingly, the list records the highest number of journals from the University of the Punjab (18), followed by the University of Management & Technology (UMT) (14) and the University of Lahore (12). Although this indicates a significant gap in university-wide contributions, universities have successfully registered their journals on the current list. Additionally, the HEC has opened the door to appeals for journal reevaluation, which might increase the number of journals from universities.

Second, the previous list had recorded 720 research journals, with the majority coming from independent organisations, companies and so forth. This year, the HEC has applied a more rigorous journal evaluation process, as shown by its decision to recognise only 355 journals. It is worth noting that the HEC may have received more applications this time, which could have resulted in more journals than in the previous list if more had been approved; listing only 355 journals reflects rigorous journal evaluation. Another interesting step the HEC has taken is excluding many predatory research journals, whose peer review was highly questionable.

However, the HEC encourages authors to publish only in nationally recognised journals, but it does not encourage journals to meet the international standards of global indexing database agencies like Scopus, Web of Science (WoS), and so on. WoS-indexed journals fall in the higher categories (X and W), while 342 Pakistani journals currently fall in the lower Y category, with 12 in X and one in W. This calls for a policy mechanism to help journals reach the higher ranks of X and W. Also, universities should be encouraged to conduct yearly training sessions for journal authorities on including journals in database agencies within a fixed timeline.

The HEC should formulate a framework to follow, such as frequent delisting of a journal if it violates standards, and its removal should be widely announced on social media and on the HEC’s portal. Limitations on the number of annual issues a journal can publish and the number of articles to be published in each issue should also be set. Just as academic programmes are evaluated annually for progress, journals should be reassessed annually in the same spirit, for which a relevant assessment team must be constituted. This will prevent calls for applications to include new or existing journals.

It is also problematic to note that the HEC’s policy is significantly mismatched with the QS World University Rankings, as it places WoS-indexed journals (ESCI, SCIE, SSCI and AHCI) in the highest national recognition categories (X and W), while not considering any Scopus-only journal in either category, which is a questionable decision. This is because QS’s bibliometric assessment of university research depends heavily on publications and citations indexed in Scopus. Resultantly, a publication may achieve the highest recognition based on the HEC’s extant framework but may not contribute to the university’s research indices if the publication itself is not included in the Scopus database.

Based on the HEC’s categorisation of national and international Scopus journals, a strong alignment discrepancy remains. For example, it places a Pakistani journal indexed in Scopus in the X category with some conditions, but does not categorise any international Scopus-indexed journal in the X category. It does not include any international Scopus-indexed journal in either the X or W categories. This highlights an important gap in the categorisation of Scopus-indexed and WoS-indexed journals. The HEC requires publications in WoS-indexed journals, while QS accepts only Scopus-indexed publications, not those indexed in WoS. This is a potential policy mismatch between these patterns.

On the one hand, the HEC requires publications in WoS journals and subsequently encourages universities to be included in the QS World University Rankings, while the criteria for both the HEC and QS are quite polar opposites. This concern, therefore, needs to be addressed promptly. Overall, the policy needs significant reforms not only nationally but also globally. Alignment in journal categorisations is the need of the hour.

The writer works at Salim Habib University, Karachi. He can be reached at: [email protected]