Submissions

Author Guidelines

1. Purpose of These Guidelines

These guidelines help authors prepare and submit manuscripts to the African Journal of Insurance and Finance (AJIF). Read them together with the AJIF Editorial Policy, Publication Ethics requirements, and any specific instructions issued in a call for papers.

2. Manuscript Types and Word Limits

Manuscript Type	Purpose	Indicative Word Limit
Original Research Articles	Empirical, theoretical, or conceptual articles that generate new knowledge and demonstrate methodological or analytical rigor.	5,000–8,000 words
Review Articles	Critical syntheses of existing literature, evidence, policy, or practice in a defined area.	Max. 5,000 words
Policy and Practice Papers	Evidence-based papers addressing policy, regulatory, institutional, or industry challenges with practical recommendations.	Max. 2,500 words
Case Studies	Evidence-based analysis of an organization, product, policy, programme, intervention, regulatory action, or market development.	Max. 2,500 words
Industry/Professional Insights	Practitioner-oriented articles sharing innovations, field experience, lessons, or emerging practices.	Max. 2,000 words
Research Notes	Short scholarly contributions presenting preliminary findings, methodological reflections, datasets, or emerging research ideas.	2,000–3,000 words
Evidence-Informed Commentaries	Short analytical reflections on emerging issues, normally by invitation or at the Editor’s discretion.	Max. 2,000 words
Book Reviews	Critical reviews of recent books relevant to insurance, finance, risk management, policy, or regulation.	1,000–1,500 words

Word limits exclude references, tables, figures, appendices, and supplementary material unless otherwise stated. Authors should clearly indicate the manuscript type at submission. AJIF may reclassify a manuscript after editorial assessment.

3. General Formatting Requirements

Manuscripts should be submitted in Microsoft Word format unless otherwise approved.
Use clear, professional English. Authors may use either British or American English, but usage should be consistent throughout the manuscript.
Use 12-point Times New Roman or Arial, double spacing, one-inch margins, page numbers, and clear heading levels.
Use APA 7th edition for in-text citations and references.
Tables, figures, charts, and diagrams should be numbered, titled, cited in the text, and submitted in editable or high-resolution format where possible.
Do not include author names, acknowledgements, or identifying metadata in the anonymized manuscript.

4. Submission Package

An anonymized manuscript for peer review.
A separate title page with author names, affiliations, emails, country, and ORCID iDs where available.
A manuscript submission declaration form.
Ethics approval information or explanation where not applicable.
Funding and conflict-of-interest declarations.
AI-use disclosure where applicable.
Tables, figures, appendices, instruments, permissions, or supplementary files where applicable.

5. Title Page

Full manuscript title.
Manuscript type.
Full names of all authors.
Author affiliations and country.
Email addresses of all authors.
Corresponding author details.
ORCID iDs, where available.
Funding statement.
Conflict-of-interest statement.
Acknowledgements, where applicable.

Submission Preparation Checklist

All submissions must meet the following requirements.

The submission has not been previously published, nor is it before another journal for consideration (or an explanation has been provided in Comments to the Editor).
The submission file is in OpenOffice, Microsoft Word, RTF, or WordPerfect document file format.
Where available, URLs for the references have been provided.
The text is double-spaced; uses a 12-point font; employs italics, rather than underlining (except with URL addresses); and all illustrations, figures, and tables are placed within the text at the appropriate points, rather than at the end.
The text adheres to the stylistic and bibliographic requirements outlined in the Author Guidelines, which are found in About the Journal.
If submitting to a peer-reviewed section of the journal, the instructions in Ensuring a Blind Review have been followed.

Articles

Section default policy

Editorial

Section default policy

Privacy Statement

1. Introduction

The African Journal of Insurance and Finance (AJIF) is committed to protecting the privacy, confidentiality, and personal information of authors, reviewers, editors, readers, researchers, and other users who interact with the Journal and its online publishing platform.

Personal information collected by AJIF will be processed responsibly and securely, and only for legitimate scholarly publishing, administrative, communication, and related purposes. The Journal seeks to apply recognized principles of data protection, research integrity and ethical scholarly publishing.

2. Information Collected

AJIF may collect personal information when individuals register on the Journal website, submit manuscripts, participate in peer review, subscribe to notifications, communicate with the editorial office, or otherwise interact with the Journal.

Names and professional titles;
Institutional affiliations;
Postal and physical addresses where necessary;
Email addresses and telephone numbers;
ORCID iDs and other researcher identifiers;
Academic qualifications and areas of expertise;
Biographical information;
Manuscript submission and publication records;
Peer-review history;
Editorial correspondence;
Conflict-of-interest declarations;
Website registration and account information; and
Technical information generated through use of the Journal online platform, including IP addresses, browser information and access logs where applicable.

AJIF will only collect information that is reasonably necessary for the operation and development of the Journal.

3. How Personal Information Is Used

Information collected by AJIF may be used to:

Administer manuscript submission, screening, peer review, editorial decision-making and publication;
Identify and communicate with authors, reviewers, editors and other contributors;
Match manuscripts with suitably qualified reviewers;
Maintain accurate records of editorial and peer-review processes;
Publish author names, institutional affiliations, ORCID identifiers and other information normally associated with scholarly publications;
Facilitate indexing, abstracting, citation, DOI registration and research discoverability;
Communicate journal announcements, calls for papers and other scholarly information to users who have elected to receive such communications;
Maintain the security and integrity of the Journal's digital publishing platform;
Prevent plagiarism, research misconduct, fraud, duplicate submission or other breaches of publication ethics;
Produce aggregated and anonymized statistics relating to submissions, readership, geographic reach and Journal performance; and
Fulfill applicable legal, regulatory and institutional obligations.

Personal information will not be used for purposes that are materially inconsistent with the purpose for which it was collected without appropriate notice or consent.