To what extent are predatory publishing practices a real problem?

The second tranche of meetings of the IAP Working Group (WG) leading "Combatting Predatory Academic Journals and Conferences" took place last month, following an intense period of sub-group working to further scope the project and interrogate published literature.   The project has entered an important period of evidence-gathering, which comprises:

1. Stakeholder dialogue sessions: these are closed meetings where WG members are hearing from leading representatives of key sectors who can inform the project and help effect positive change.  These include the research community, research funding agencies, publishers, libraries and indexing services, universities, and leaders in international science governance.
2. A survey of the global research community: to be launched shortly, this survey is a vital part of the project's intelligence and will help the WG to gauge the awareness, extent and impact of predatory practices amongst the global research community, and devise appropriate interventions to combat them.  All IAP members will be encouraged to complete a short questionnaire and share it with their own networks: it will be sent out in the next few weeks and routed through IAP and its regional networks, the Global Young Academy (GYA), The World Academy of Science (TWAS) and other important global networks.