More and better scientific publications

From 2017 to 2021, Morocco has significantly improved its scientific production. In five years, the number of Moroccan publications has increased by 66%. This is revealed in the report on the research landscape in Morocco, recently produced by the international publisher of scientific literature, Elsevier. Moroccan scientific production is growing faster than the African average (61%), and much faster than the world average (23%). From 2020 onwards, the Kingdom was able to greatly exceed its neighbors in the Maghreb region, with 10,093 publications, against 8,543 for Tunisia and 8,388 for Algeria. The number of authors also improved, from 11,066 in 2017 to 17,414 in 2021, an increase of 57.4%, with a total of 37,980 over the period. Here again, the evolution is more marked than in Algeria (+36%) and  Tunisia (+7.9%). In terms of impact, too, Morocco is making headway. The impact is generally measured by an indicator, FWCI ( Field- weighted citation impact), making it possible to compare the number of citations of a publication with similar publications in the same field of research. The indicator is always defined in reference to a global baseline of 1. Over the 2017-2021 period, Morocco’s average FWCI is 1.02, which means that Moroccan publications are above 0.02% global average. This is a positive point for the trajectory of Moroccan research, according to experts from Elsevier. The Moroccan indicator is also higher than that of Algeria (0.97) and Tunisia (0.95), even if Moroccan productions make less use of international collaborations. Moreover, Morocco imposes itself better on the side of the top 10% citation percentiles. For Elsevier, improving international collaboration would allow Morocco to further enhance the impact of its scientific publications. However, Morocco’s FWCI remains lower than that of the continent, estimated at 1.05 over the past five years. Another downside is the quality of the journals in which Moroccan authors choose to publish. According to the report, a large part of the results of Moroccan research are published in low-level journals, which do not respect international standards and do not encourage excellence. Nearly 45.6% of Moroccan publications appear in journals ranked among those justifying the lowest impact factors. Only 27.4% appear in the top 25% of journals, and almost as many in those falling within the top 25%-50%. Elsevier recommends a large training campaign in order to make researchers aware of the interest of the choice of publication medium, and which determines the impact of their research. At the same time, the publisher emphasizes international collaborations in terms of publications, whose potential in terms of citations is often greater. 

Ahlam NAZIH