In mainland China (PRC) there are upward of 12,000 journals tracked by CQVIP (Chongqing VIP Information Co., Ltd.), which was formerly known as the Database Research Center under the Chongqing Branch of Institute of Scientific & Technical Information of China (CB-ISTIC), which was China's first Chinese journal database research institution. The Database Research Center of CB-ISTIC, was established in 1989, and served as mainland China’s database industry pioneer. It subsequently developed and launched the CB ISTIC/CEPC Periodicals ChinaBase, which was not only China's first Chinese Journal Literature database, but also China's largest self-built Chinese literature database.
Under CQVIP’s umbrella, we have also been able to identify the following services/products:
Journal Products
VIP Journal Integration Platform (VJIP)
VIP China Science Journal Citation Report (VJCR)
VIP-Google Scholar Database (VGSD)
China Science and Technology Journal Database (CSTJ)
China Citation Database (CCD)
China Science Indicators Database (CSI)
China Education Information System (CEIS)
Platform Products
VIP Exam Resources System (VERS)
Library Discipline Service Platform (LDSP)
Literature Sharing Service Platform (LSSP)
Other Products
China Science & Technology Economic News Database (CSTN)
As a footnote to our research concerning CQVIP, we sent them an email to their
web site’s contact email at web@cqvip.com
because the word ‘ecnomic’ was spelled incorrectly in their name of their
CSTN database. Of course the email bounced back to us in seconds (So much for
our efforts in trying to help Chinese academia).
In December 2020, an SJR search of Chinese journals returned 662 journals for the PRC, and 105 for Taiwan. From one study [78], China’s CNKI’s (China National Knowledge Infrastructure) academic journals section on March 12, 2020 listed 11,409 scholarly journals and full-text papers totaling 68,411,044. However, what is not clear to us does the CNKI also count journals in the ROC? However, these numbers are amazing when you consider that China published 21 journals in 1970 and only 930 journals by 1978. Another research tool available is the Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index (CSSCI, Chinese: 中文社会科学引文索引). More discussion about China’s commercial databases offered through CQVIP.
It is also interesting to note from a journal article in Nature on 28 February 2020 stated that China has banned author cash rewards for article publication [207]. One reason might be due to recent research that claims publishing fraud [49] is being committed by several Chinese medical institutions and their staff [50]. This is also noteworthy since Chinese authored articles have increased from 120,000 a year in 2009 to 450,000 in 2019 in SCI’s 9,000 journals.
Also, according to the University World News [208], after years of pushing Chinese researchers to publish in prestigious international journals, China’s Ministry of Education and Ministry of Science and Technology have jointly released a document on 18 February 2020 whose aim is at reducing “excessive reliance” on the Science Citation Index (SCI) or the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) papers for academic promotions, job offers, and allocation of research funding [209]. The move by the two ministries and backed by the Finance Ministry, which is responsible for national-level research funding, is a radical change away from the publish-or-perish culture that pressures researchers and academics in China to aim for articles and papers geared towards international publications. For the longest time, China’s scientific research evaluation system [88] has been defined by the standards of “papers published, title garnered, education level, awards received”, meaning that scientists who have published countless papers, received many titles, possess great academic backgrounds and received numerous received would be in more favorable position.
Furthermore, in an article published in Science titled – “Cash bonuses for peer-reviewed papers go global” [89], the author systematically analyzed the average of global cash bonuses provided for scientific papers around the world on August 10, 2017, with China soaring to the top of the list. This is because Chinese universities typically offer first time authors >US$ 43,000 for publishing a paper in Science or Nature, with the top reward for such papers a jaw-dropping amount of US$ 165,000, 8.3 times as much (approx. US$ 20,000) as Saudi Arabia which ranked second, and about 30 times more than developed countries such as the UK, the U.S., and Australia. It is worth noting that most of the countries included in the list are developing countries, indicating a common trait of developing countries is to stimulate research with cash bonuses.
However, China’s move away from international research publication was first announced by President Xi Jinping during a national education conference in 2018 [88]. At the conference he stated that academic standards in higher education institutions could not be led significantly by Western ideas or standards and stressed that China should have its own academic standards and norms, not bound by international norms. Universities will also not list publishing SCI papers as a requirement for students to get doctoral degrees according to the new guidelines, with APC caps set at $2,850 [102].
Anything that affects publishing habits in China has the potential to affect domestic and international publishers worldwide. According to Clarivate’s WoS, authors affiliated with Chinese organizations contributed to 20% of research articles and review articles (the types of content that matters the most commercially and academically) in 2018 [101], with Chinese papers exceeding 30% for two of the top eight publishers. Moreover, China has been a key driver of content growth for many international publishers in recent years. Obviously, a fall in China’s world academic ranking is not far behind [64], and it will not be long before the impact of the policy becomes tangible [101],
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