Think twice before rejecting a Brazilian marine biology study

It's not uncommon to get a negative answer from editors from important scientific journals dealing with Marine Biology based on "your research is of regional interest". I've been doing my best to avoid such statement, but I still get this kind of answer. I believe that when the Editor read that I am from Brazil, he thinks that our science is important only to Brazilians. Dear Editors, Brazilian coastline has more than 6000 km of extension. It's probably the same lenght of the coastline of all European coutries together. I work with populational aspects of the species, so, I have to have a specific sampling site. So, it is obvious that there is a region in my work.

The outcome of such approach from the editors can be seen in the figure pictured above. It was taken from a review published in 2012 (Marshall et al. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Evol. Syst. 2012. 43:97–114), in which the authors try to find a general pattern about life history traits of marine invertebrates along the globe. Note that the long Brazilian coast is devoid of studies (as is most of the Tropical Atlantic Ocean). So, when you deny a manuscript that you think is of "regional" interest, think that you might be impeding beautiful global metaanalysis.