Africa Launches First Continet-Led Bilingual Open-Access Journal for Health Economics and Policy
The journal operates on a 100 percent open-access model and will not charge article processing fees for researchers at African institutions, writes Lydia Makina
Eleven of Africa’s most distinguished health economics, systems and policy researchers have joined forces to launch the African Journal of Health Economics, Systems and Policy (AJHESP), the continent’s first bilingual, fully open-access, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to health economics, health systems and health policy.
The launch comes as African governments face mounting pressure to build sustainable domestic health financing systems while development assistance for health continues to contract sharply.
Research published in The Lancet by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation shows that development assistance for health in Africa fell from $80 billion in 2021 to under $40 billion by 2025, more than halving in four years. AJHESP positions itself as a platform for the policy-relevant, Africa-rooted evidence that this moment demands.
AJHESP will publish in both English and French, with authors able to submit in either language. Every submission is reviewed in the language it is written, and abstracts, editorial communications, and website content will be available in both languages. Authors also have the option to submit abstracts in an African language. T
The journal operates on a 100 percent open-access model and will not charge article processing fees for researchers at African institutions. Its scope covers health economics, health systems, health financing, and health policy.
To bridge the gap between researchers and decision-makers, AJHESP will also produce a companion podcast that extends the conversation beyond the page.
For decades, African health economics and financing research has been published predominantly in journals headquartered in Europe and North America, often behind paywalls that limit access for the policymakers who need it most.
AJHESP aims to close that gap. The journal is built in Africa, led by African researchers, and designed to produce evidence that is easily accessible to African policymakers and actionable in the health systems where it is generated.
“African health economics data and research are more important now to inform the evolving health financing landscape,” said Prof. Justice Nonvignon, Co-Editor-in-Chief of AJHESP and Professor of Health Economics at the University of Ghana.
“How the story of African health financing systems is told requires more context, which often gets missed when the data are published elsewhere. AJHESP is the place to tell that story better and shape context-relevant and evidence-informed policies.”
The journal also addresses the persistent marginalisation of Francophone African health economics research. “Francophone Africa has been generating rigorous health economics evidence for decades,” said Dr. Fadima Yaya Bocoum, Founding Editor from IRSS-CNRST in Burkina Faso. “What has been missing is a bilingual platform that makes that work visible to English-speaking researchers and policymakers, and vice versa. AJHESP bridges that divide.”
AJHESP’s editorial model emphasizes context-relevant peer review. All submissions are assessed on whether the evidence is meaningful for African health systems, and associate editors are based in or deeply engaged with the African contexts they review.
Alongside traditional research articles, the journal will publish Policy Papers, Commentaries, and Perspectives — article types designed to bridge the gap between evidence generation and policy action.
“African researchers in the diaspora have always had to navigate a choice: publish where it counts for your career or publish where it matters for the communities you came from,” said Prof. Lumbwe Chola, Founding Editor based at the University of Oslo. “AJHESP makes that a false choice.”
“The distance between a peer-reviewed paper and a policy decision is real and well-documented,” added Dr. Juliet Nabyonga-Orem, Founding Editor with the WHO Regional Office for Africa. “This journal was designed with that distance in mind, not just to produce evidence, but to produce evidence in a form that travels.”
The founding editorial board brings together 11 researchers from 10 countries across Africa and the diaspora, with collective expertise spanning more than 750 peer-reviewed publications. Co-Editors-in-Chief are Prof. Justice Nonvignon of the University of Ghana and Dr. Alex Adjagba, Senior Health Adviser and Global Lead for Health Economics and Financing at the UNICEF Center of Excellence in Nairobi.
“African governments are being asked to finance their own health systems at the exact moment donor funding is contracting,” said Dr. Adjagba. “That requires evidence — the right evidence, produced in the right context, accessible to the right people. That is the gap AJHESP fills.”
AJHESP is an independent, double-blind, peer-reviewed journal and is not an official publication of any United Nations agency, government, or international organisation. The founding editors serve in their individual academic and professional capacities.
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