The increasing divide between First and Third Worlds: science, collaboration and conservation of Third World aquatic ecosystems

1. Ten of the leading journals in the field of freshwater ecology were identified using the Science Citation Index’s Journal Citation Reports. These journals were surveyed to assess the levels and patterns of collaboration in research initiatives in regions of the Third World. Membership demographics of five professional societies in this field were also examined to elucidate distribution patterns of practitioners in the field. 2. In total, 8960 papers were surveyed, of which only forty were published in a language other than English. Senior authors came from 114 of the 130 different countries listed among authors’ addresses. Of these, forty‐five were from Third World countries and sixty‐nine from the First World. Five countries were responsible for 60.64% of the papers submitted; the United States = 25.65%; Canada = 11.55%; Australia = 10.15%; the United Kingdom = 6.73%; New Zealand = 6.56%. Multi‐authored papers accounted for 73.05% of all papers. 3. Papers by authors from Third World countries accounted for only 10.93% of single‐author papers and less than 10% of multi‐authored papers. Collaboration was found in 73.05% of the papers surveyed, the vast majority of which (87.39%) was between authors from First World countries. Only 825 (9.21%) of the papers surveyed involved authors from different countries. Most of this collaboration (72.36%) was between authors from different First World countries. 4. Some 1038 papers surveyed included research undertaken in, or included authors from, Third World countries. The majority of these papers (69.08%) were submitted by authors from Third World countries, involving either multiple or single authorship. The third most common publication relating to research in Third World regions (17.4%) came from single‐author papers in which the authors were from a First World country. Only four of the papers surveyed were submitted by single authors from Third World countries working in First World countries. 5. There is a disproportionate representation of taxonomic (20.3%) and marine (10.5%) papers from the Third World regions in comparison to both lentic (8.0%) and lotic (7.4%) papers. 6. Membership demographics of the professional societies surveyed continue to reflect the historical origins of freshwater ecology. More than 80% of members in the three largest societies examined are registered in Europe and North America, while membership of the remaining societies remains largely regional. 7. It is argued that present levels of collaboration and technology transfer from the First World to the Third World are inadequate and that, given the widening gulf in terms of personnel and resources, the future of essential research on inland waters in the Third World does not bode well unless in situ capacity building within Third World countries becomes a target of First World research and funding agencies.