Country-Level Environmental Performance: Investment, Education, and Research and Development

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 3)

Dear Colleagues! I am a reviewer for this article. I looked at the changes made by the authors in the article. I read the entire material. the article is well-edited and I recommend it for publication

Author Response

Thank you for your valuable time and effort in reviewing our work. Your input is greatly appreciated and will help us improve our performance in the future.

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

I have no additional comments but this should be looked at by another referee. 

Fine.

Author Response

Thank you for your valuable time and effort in reviewing our work. Your input is greatly appreciated and will help us improve our performance in the future.

Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)

Congratulations on the authors' line of research.

I consider the topic of the article to be very current and relevant for academics, school institutions, different organizations, governments and internal and global policies, as well as other interested parties. However, I consider that the work presents a very superficial approach to the topic under study and is vague in the research gap.

I would also like to make some suggestions for authors to reflect on:

- The Introduction can be improved, in accordance with the journal's rules, and include: the main objective of the article; the methodology; originality, contributions and implications; brief conclusions. In the introduction, add the research gap that justifies its contribution to the literature in different aspects, with theoretical foundations, as well as the structuring of the article.

- The literature review on the topic under study could be more in-depth, providing better support for the investigation and solidity to the entire work (analysis, results, discussion, …);

- Line 23, 27 (41) - would put (UN, 2021); (EPA, 2022);

- References - check whether they comply with the magazine's standards, as throughout the work.

Author Response

We appreciate your comments. We have attended to your observations:

Point 1: The Introduction can be improved, in accordance with the journal's rules, and include: the main objective of the article; the methodology; originality, contributions and implications; brief conclusions. In the introduction, add the research gap that justifies its contribution to the literature in different aspects, with theoretical foundations, as well as the structuring of the article.

Response 1: The introduction was modified according to your suggestions.

Point 2: The literature review on the topic under study could be more in-depth, providing better support for the investigation and solidity to the entire work (analysis, results, discussion, …);

Response 2: The literature review was improved with more recent research.

Point 3: Line 23, 27 (41) - would put (UN, 2021); (EPA, 2022);

Response 3: References were adjusted in accordance with the journal's regulations.

Point 4: References - check whether they comply with the magazine's standards, as throughout the work.

Response 4: References were adjusted in accordance with the journal's regulations.

Reviewer 4 Report (New Reviewer)

The objective of the study is “to analyze the influence of the resources and capacities of countries on their environmental performance”.

The manuscript must be improved:

-          The references are not correct.

-          Plagiarism was detected. Either by incorrect citations or direct copying without consulting the original document, (e.g.: line 169-172 and 3.3 of Ezzi, F., & Jarboui, A. (2016). Does innovation strategy affect financial, social and environmental performance?. Journal of Economics, Finance and Administrative Science, 21(40), 14-24).

-          Update bibliographic references. Some bibliographic references are more than 20 years old.

Author Response

We appreciate your comments. We have attended to your observations:

Point 1: The references are not correct.

Response 1: References were adjusted in accordance with the journal's regulations.

Point 2: Plagiarism was detected. Either by incorrect citations or direct copying without consulting the original document, (e.g.: line 169-172 and 3.3 of Ezzi, F., & Jarboui, A. (2016). Does innovation strategy affect financial, social and environmental performance?. Journal of Economics, Finance and Administrative Science, 21(40), 14-24).

Response 2: According to their suggestions, the plagiarism was removed from the document.

Point 3: Update bibliographic references. Some bibliographic references are more than 20 years old.

Response 3: References updated.

Point 4: Review the structure of the article, (e.g.: 1.1 to 1.4).

Response 4: The theoretical framework section was separated from the introduction section, and the structure of the sections it suggests as well as that of the entire article was reviewed.

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report (New Reviewer)

However, the references are not correct (e.g: line 28).

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you for taking the time to review the manuscript in detail. We attended to your specific observations and highlight them in the document. Below, you will find the response to your comment.

Point 1: However, the references are not correct (e.g: line 28).

Response 1: We are grateful with your review. We have already reviewed the entire manuscript in detail and corrected the references.

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper analyzes factors associated with country-level environment sustainability scores. The paper utilizes linear regression models for a cross section of countries derived from a database containing Data on country performance across a number of dimensions.

The principal finding of the paper is that the levels of education and innovation within the studied countries are found to be significant determinants of environmental performance of the studied countries measured with the use of selected environment sustainability indicator.

The paper has a number of methodological drawbacks which should be considered at the stage of revision. To start with, it is unclear why from the multitude of variables which are available in the database used in the study the authors decided to utilize and investigate only a few. This makes for a modest contribution. The database referenced in the paper allows for a broader investigation of the factors associated with country-level environmental sustainability performance.

The second problem from the methodological perspective is the design of the regression model used in the analysis. It does not contain a constant term, or the authors decided not to report it. The number of observations in the model is also not reported. The F-statistic for the entire regression model is not reported either, and it should be because it gives an idea of the joint statistical significance of the equation coefficients. All these stats need to be reported.

The most important problem that I see from the methodological standpoint is the problem of endogeneity. The authors should address it by running additional robustness tests, and if necessary use additional data to confirm the link, which is reported to be causal. There are no control variables (for example GDP per capita, population density etc.). The inclusion of control variables will most likely change the results obtained by the authors significantly. The authors claim that education and innovation are impacting the environmental sustainability score. And it is not obvious why this is a causal relationship and not just a correlation. Control variables are necessary in a context of multivariate econometric analysis.

A clear formulation of research hypotheses or research questions would help the readers better understand the goals of the paper.

Without the robustness tests proving causality the paper remains open to methodological criticism. The descriptive statistics for the variable used in the analysis are also missing. Univariate statistical tests may also be useful to further strengthen the point presented by the authors.

Additional proofreading will also be beneficial.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Referee Report

“Investment, education, research and development on the environmental performance of countries”

This paper is an empirical look at the relationship between three variables and environmental performance. Those three variables are index numbers representing education, research and development, and education.  The dependent variable is environmental performance, also an index number.  All three variables are a cross-section and come from an index called the Global Innovation Index. 

There is a large literature on economic development (of which investment, education, and research and development are all related) and the environment. This is called the Environmental Kuznets Curve. While the empirics of it are hotly debated, there are a large number of relationships that are empirically associated with environmental quality.  The current paper does not mention these. I would highly recommend that the authors read some of the literature on the environmental Kuznets Curve listed below and then go about re-estimating their model. A reading of this literature will result in a revised paper that avoids several problems, especially my major comment #1.

Major Comment #1 – Omitted Variable Bias

The literature is filled with numerous determinants of environmental quality. The level of income (as is this is a key point of the Environmental Kuznets Curve) is a key one. See also papers like Esty and Porter (2005) and Madni et al (2021) for more ideas. Failure to include all relevant variables in your model is problematic, especially since you do not have a causal inference framework.

Major Comment #2 – Too High of a Level of Aggregation

All the data in this paper come from one index, which is comprised of sub-indexes.  Since a wide variety of data streams are in each index, it is unclear what policymakers or other researchers should take away from the findings.  If education is positive and significant, is that because of education expenditures, government funding, or pupil-teacher ratios?  It is okay to use more precise data so that researchers know exactly what is going on.

Major Comment #3 – Causal Claims

The authors make causal claims regarding their findings. They do not use a causal inference framework and instead report mere correlations.  I would encourage removal of all causal language given that the paper just shows associations.

Major Comment #4 – Panel Data

Even if the authors want to stay with using just the Global Innovation Index, why do the authors not use all five years of the index? That way they can at least do a panel data analysis with country fixed effects.

Minor Comments

Did you include a constant in Table 1?

The paper mentions estimating a hierarchal model but none of the data is embedded at different levels. Please clarify.

Similarly, the paper mentions “levels” with respect to the variables multiple times and never clarifies why.

The paper never defines what is in the environmental performance variable from the Global Innovation Index.

References

Dasgupta, Susmita, Benoit Laplante, Hua Wang, and David Wheeler. "Confronting the environmental Kuznets curve." Journal of Economic Perspectives 16, no. 1 (2002): 147-168.

De Bruyn, Sander M., Jeroen CJM van den Bergh, and Johannes B. Opschoor. "Economic growth and emissions: reconsidering the empirical basis of environmental Kuznets curves." Ecological Economics 25, no. 2 (1998): 161-175.

Dinda, Soumyananda. "Environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis: a survey." Ecological Economics 49, no. 4 (2004): 431-455.

Esty, Daniel C., and Michael E. Porter. "National environmental performance: an empirical analysis of policy results and determinants." Environment and development economics 10, no. 4 (2005): 391-434.

Madni, Ghulam Rasool, Muhammad Awais Anwar, and Nawaz Ahmad. "Socio-economic determinants of environmental performance in developing countries." Journal of the Knowledge Economy (2021): 1-12.

Stern, David I. "The environmental Kuznets curve after 25 years." Journal of Bioeconomics 19 (2017): 7-28.

The main thing I noticed was excessive use of the in front of terms where it is not necessary. "the" research and development is not necessary. Research and development works just fine. 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The presented article is an up-to-date exposition of the consideration of the relationship between the environmental component of countries and various factors that can be used to influence its content. However, there are several recommendations that may enhance the content of the article and will be interesting for readers

The list of references contains a lot of outdated sources of information, which indicates that the literary review is unrepresentative. The point is that the author should expand the scientific debate in the literary review with the help of modern 2022.2023 literature sources.

  it is important to take into account the post-Covid factor, as well as the ongoing geopolitical transformations that are taking place in the modern world, which were tested for education, investment, changes in the vector towards green energy production

This question remains unanswered. developing countries do not have the necessary investments for the development of education, for the development of the country’s infectious potential, respectively, the environmental component Budnitsa point The author has proven this. but how to deal with their situation in order to improve performance?

A debatable question remains: it is necessary to increase scientific research for environmental development or expand scientific research in general. Point here, I would like to know the position of the authors

The hypothesis put forward by the authors is initially understandable and well known. What is the uniqueness of the results obtained, which may have scientific and practical significance?

  It is important to indicate the period of the study and the location of the study. the qualitative characteristics of the survey and research results are not indicated

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf