The paper by Charles Conteh, a professor at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, appeared in Sage’s Outlook on Agriculture in October 2023. It has one citation, according to Clarivate’s Web of Science. An inquiry by Brock identified plagiarism and uncredited authorship in the article, according to the report finalized this March.
Amy Lemay, now a science analyst and founder at VISTA Science & Technology Inc., was Conteh’s postdoctoral fellow from August 2020 to January 2023. Lemay discovered the published paper online by accident. The article used text from the policy briefs she had worked on, without citing those sources.
Lemay asked Conteh to add her as a co-author to the paper. In October, Conteh asked a journal editor if the authorship could be updated to include Lemay and another co-author’s name. In November, Jillian Lenne, an editor at Outlook on Agriculture, said it was too late to update the authorship as the paper was already accepted. Lemay then requested Sage retract the paper for misrepresented authorship and copying previous publications without citation.
The article was retracted in May, with the following notice: "Due to the unattributed text which calls into question the author contributions in this article, the Journal Editor has retracted this article."
