Note from the editor

People now realize that globalization is not only for the multinationals and the circulation of money

Lakhdar Brahimi (1934 -)
UN peace envoy & advisor

As reported in the November 2012 edition of the South African Journal of Industrial Engineering (SAJIE), the open access on-line presence of SAJIE became a reality during that month. In its previous guise, SAJIE would be mailed to the members of the Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering (typically between 600 and 700 members) of which only a few were based outside of South Africa.

On the day that the new on-line presence realised, a Google Analytics account was set up to monitor the traffic to the SAJIE website. By the end of April 2013, the website had received more than 9 500 visits from almost 5 900 unique visitors representing 125 countries of the world. The on-line presence of SAJIE has catapulted the Journal into the global arena.

As part of the rejuvenation of SAJIE a new editorial board has been constituted - it reflects the growing international footprint of the Journal as well as certain strategic alliances forged by SAJIE with other publications and associations.

The visibility of the Journal has produced a stream of articles - at the time of going to press, more than 60 articles were in various stages of the review process. The challenge of finding suitable and willing reviewers to execute the double blind peer review process has become a major challenge.

Readers of SAJIE are encouraged to visit the new website at http://sajie.journals.ac.za to register as readers, authors or reviewers. At present, there are 318 users registered on the website. A registered user receives notifications from the website when new issues are published and will from time to time be alerted to announcements (for example conference opportunities). However, the announcements are limited to only a few.

In the May 2013 edition of SAJIE ten of the 14 articles have some South African connection -either through authorship or affiliation. Seven South African higher education institutions are represented. It should be noted that SAJIE will continue its emphasis on South African articles as in the past. However, if the aim is to raise the impact factor of the Journal, the acceptance of international articles is a sine qua non.

Susan Adendorff
Editor