Evaluation of Sustainability of Irrigated Crops in Arid Regions, China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors assess a programme of rural development through the evaluation of the economic and environmental sustainability of major crops in a region in China. The subject is very interesting, modern and important from academic and policy points of view and relevant to the scope of the Journal. However, the manuscript has major drawbacks and I believe that it could be potentially considered for publication if the authors are willing to engage into non-trivial (major) revisions.

Overall, the paper is fairly organized and well structured, but there are serious issues concerning the use of English. The manuscript requires an extensive revision by a native speaker, since there is numerous spelling, and grammatical errors in the text.

The introduction of the paper provides a solid background and sets a good beginning to understand the whole paper, the problem is defined succinctly, however, I believe that the objective of the study is not described in-depth. The authors could elaborate more on this in the last paragraph of the section in lines 78-84. Moreover, I believe that the authors should include in the Introduction a concise description the approach that they applied for the development of the proposed framework. It would be for the benefit of the reader. The authors describe the motivation of their study, but they should explain in-depth their contribution to the existing literature. This is not very clear in the manuscript.

In Section 2.3 the authors state the Table 1 includes the expenses for the production of the crops, however, there are no such variables in the table. I cannot understand why it is necessary to estimate the CB ratio for the assessment of the economic performance of the farms. The estimation of the profit (or the gross margin) which is the economic results mainly used in modern agricultural economics would be adequate. Moreover, it would be interesting to conduct a marginal analysis and estimate the marginal value products of the production factors used. The calculation of the ratio of production volume per unit of cost is not a robust indicator since it does not take into consideration the different prices between the crops.

In Section 2.5, in line 141 the authors mention in the parenthesis: LCA. Did they apply a life cycle assessment approach? However, the main issue here is that the authors do not provide a detailed description of the indicators used in their overall sustainability assessment. Has the indicator described in l. 249 been used before in similar investigations? Please explain how this indicator has been developed and also indicate how the various weights for the four factors in the equation have been estimated.

In general, the authors seem to be familiar with the existing state of knowledge, while the arguments employed are logically consistent and empirically supported. The figures and the tables are useful and meaningful and enhance the beauty and the readability of the paper. The findings of the paper are presented and discussed; however, the conclusion is not complete with an in-depth assessment of the structural adjustments that were implemented, and a clear set of policy recommendations regard rural development in the Region.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Point 1: The authors assess a programme of rural development through the evaluation of the economic and environmental sustainability of major crops in a region in China. The subject is very interesting, modern and important from academic and policy points of view and relevant to the scope of the Journal. However, the manuscript has major drawbacks and I believe that it could be potentially considered for publication if the authors are willing to engage into non-trivial (major) revisions.

Response 1: We acknowledge your time and useful comments of this manuscript. We did revise the manuscript carefully, hope this new version will be more suitable for publication.

 

Point 2: Overall, the paper is fairly organized and well structured, but there are serious issues concerning the use of English. The manuscript requires an extensive revision by a native speaker, since there is numerous spelling, and grammatical errors in the text.

Response 2: Thank you very much for your comments. The language of the present manuscript has been improved by two native English speakers.

 

Point 3: The introduction of the paper provides a solid background and sets a good beginning to understand the whole paper, the problem is defined succinctly, however, I believe that the objective of the study is not described in-depth. The authors could elaborate more on this in the last paragraph of the section in lines 78-84. Moreover, I believe that the authors should include in the Introduction a concise description the approach that they applied for the development of the proposed framework. It would be for the benefit of the reader. The authors describe the motivation of their study, but they should explain in-depth their contribution to the existing literature. This is not very clear in the manuscript.

Response 3: Thanks for your comment, we have improved the introduction.

Point 4: In Section 2.3 the authors state the Table 1 includes the expenses for the production of the crops, however, there are no such variables in the table. I cannot understand why it is necessary to estimate the CB ratio for the assessment of the economic performance of the farms. The estimation of the profit (or the gross margin) which is the economic results mainly used in modern agricultural economics would be adequate. Moreover, it would be interesting to conduct a marginal analysis and estimate the marginal value products of the production factors used. The calculation of the ratio of production volume per unit of cost is not a robust indicator since it does not take into consideration the different prices between the crops.

Response 4: We appreciated your comments, we made a mistakes, Table 2 includes the expenses, not the table 1, we already corrected it. In our study, Net profit (NP), Benefit-cost ratio (BCR) and Economic productivity (PR) were used to evaluate the economic performance of crops, because those three indicators are commonly used in crop production system. We totally agree with you， those three indicators are sensitive to the market price. Marginal analysis of the products would be more useful. We added a new section “Caveats of the study”, in this section, we addressed the limitations of those indicators.

Point 5: In Section 2.5, in line 141 the authors mention in the parenthesis: LCA. Did they apply a life cycle assessment approach? However, the main issue here is that the authors do not provide a detailed description of the indicators used in their overall sustainability assessment. Has the indicator described in l. 249 been used before in similar investigations? Please explain how this indicator has been developed and also indicate how the various weights for the four factors in the equation have been estimated.

Response 5: Thank you so much for letting us realizing the description of the method part is not clear. We did rewrite method, especially “Environmental assessment” section. In the new version, we also explained the weights of three effects are equal.

Point 6: In general, the authors seem to be familiar with the existing state of knowledge, while the arguments employed are logically consistent and empirically supported. The figures and the tables are useful and meaningful and enhance the beauty and the readability of the paper. The findings of the paper are presented and discussed; however, the conclusion is not complete with an in-depth assessment of the structural adjustments that were implemented, and a clear set of policy recommendations regard rural development in the Region.

Response 6: Thank you so much, according to your suggestion, we rewrote the conclusion, and also give the suggestions for all the relevant stakeholders.

 

Reviewer 2 Report

• You abbreviate "adjust and optimize the planting structure program" as APSP. Is this a conventional abbreviation? Otherwise I would abbrevate this as AOPST.
• raw 93: "Climate" not with capital letter
• raw 109: "for further analysis which with 10% sampling error margin and in 95% confidence interval." would make sense if you describe your regression or correlation results. Here it is redundant! If I make here a mistake, please keep it.
• raws 151-152: "The values of W for NP, EUE, RNL and GHG emissions 151 are 0.33, 0.33, 0.17, and 0.17 respectively" ---> This is a central assumption. Please explain why and by whom this kind of weighting has been suggested.
• Mention that this sustainability approach enables opening/ operationalizing the "black box" of sustainability. Turns it in a kind of "white box" from the perspective of your study. Refer to https://doi.org/10.1080/14631377.2020.1745557 and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2020.100936
• raws 223-230: "China is the world’s largest chemical fertilizer consumer, nitrogen consumption account for 40% 223 of global consumption 40, the high N consumption intensive agriculture areas of China results in more 224 than 10 million tons of reactive nitrogen loss (RNL) annually, and leading to environmental 225 degradation 24,41. China is also a major emitter of GHG. Consequently, much researcher has focused 226 on China’s influence on climate change (Lal, 2004; Maraseni et al., 2007; Trost et al., 2016; Huang et 227 al., 2017). Therefore, following the environmental assessment indicators by Chen, et al. 29, this study 228 assessed the environmental impacts by calculating RNL and GHG emissions per ha of three different 229 crops in HID." ---> Many similar facts have been already indicated in the introductory part. So please put the facts that were not mentioned in the introduction to introduction. The specific statistics on RNL can be kept here.
• In the subsection 3.5 the authors address the central issue of scenario analysis. To this end write a couple of sentences on scenario analysis and refer cursorily to literature (Harvard scholars did some interesting works on this issue). Make clear that scenarios are a product of rational decision making in combination with APSP. Mention the following papers whereby scenarios have been endogenously determined by using decision-making models with utility maximizing agents (state or farmer in your study): https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41287-019-00221-7  and https://doi.org/10.3390/economies7040113
• Make clear that utility maximizing farmer's calculus could differ from sustainability maximizing condition. Underline the function of APSP.
• Conclusions part is too short. Take time and expand it. Mention and all the essential steps of the research and present extended results.

Author Response

Point 1: You abbreviate "adjust and optimize the planting structure program" as APSP. Is this a conventional abbreviation? Otherwise I would abbrevate this as AOPST.

Response 1: Thanks a lot, AOPST has been used in the new version.

Point 2: raw 93: "Climate" not with capital letter

Response 2: Thanks. It has been corrected.

Point 3: raw 109: "for further analysis which with 10% sampling error margin and in 95% confidence interval." would make sense if you describe your regression or correlation results. Here it is redundant! If I make here a mistake, please keep it.

Response 3: The above sentence was used to explain the sample selection. why 219 householders were interviewed, how the sample represents the region.

Point 4: raws 151-152: "The values of W for NP, EUE, RNL and GHG emissions are 0.33, 0.33, 0.17, and 0.17 respectively" ---> This is a central assumption. Please explain why and by whom this kind of weighting has been suggested.

Response 4: Thanks for your comments, in the new version, we explained the weight.

Point 5: Mention that this sustainability approach enables opening/ operationalizing the "black box" of sustainability. Turns it in a kind of "white box" from the perspective of your study. Refer to https://doi.org/10.1080/14631377.2020.1745557 and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seps.2020.100936

Response 5: Thanks for your recommendation of the literature. It has been cited.

Point 6: raws 223-230: "China is the world’s largest chemical fertilizer consumer, nitrogen consumption account for 40% 223 of global consumption 40, the high N consumption intensive agriculture areas of China results in more 224 than 10 million tons of reactive nitrogen loss (RNL) annually, and leading to environmental 225 degradation 24,41. China is also a major emitter of GHG. Consequently, much researcher has focused 226 on China’s influence on climate change (Lal, 2004; Maraseni et al., 2007; Trost et al., 2016; Huang et 227 al., 2017). Therefore, following the environmental assessment indicators by Chen, et al. 29, this study 228 assessed the environmental impacts by calculating RNL and GHG emissions per ha of three different 229 crops in HID." ---> Many similar facts have been already indicated in the introductory part. So please put the facts that were not mentioned in the introduction to introduction. The specific statistics on RNL can be kept here.

Response 6: Thanks for your suggestions, those part has been removed to the introduction.

Reviewer 3 Report

The paper “Evaluation sustainability of irrigated crops in arid region, China” deals with an interesting and very important topic concerning national food  security. Food security, as a synonym for making food available to each human, is desirable irrespective of the political system and socioeconomic conditions. However, some aspects of the paper will need to be strengthened and clarified before publication. My overall recommendation is ‘major revisions’.

1. In my opinion, there are no research questions or hypotheses in the article. Also, there is no indication of the research purpose (although the purpose is mentioned in the abstract of the article).

2. Line 3 - remove the dot at the end of the article title.

3. Lines 91,92, 96, 97, 121 – please change font size. Please check the font size throughout the work.

4. There is no data sources under the tables.

5. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets [ ], and placed before the punctuation; for example [1], [1–3] or [1,3].

6. The References section is not prepared according to the Instructions for Authors

e.g. Bowman, C.M.; Landee, F.A.; Reslock, M.A. Chemically Oriented Storage and Retrieval System. 1. Storage and Verification of Structural Information. J. Chem. Doc. 1967, 7, 43-47; DOI:10.1021/c160024a013.

If the article is available on the Internet, please provide the date of access.

Food and Agriculture Organization Corporate Statistical Database. Available online: http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#home (accessed on 8 October 2019).

 Generally, the article is well written.

I hope that the suggestions listed above can improve the content of the research.

 

Author Response

Point 1. In my opinion, there are no research questions or hypotheses in the article. Also, there is no indication of the research purpose (although the purpose is mentioned in the abstract of the article).

Response 1: Thanks for your useful comments, we rewrote the introduction and addressed the research questions and research objectives. Hope this version is better.

Point 2. Line 3 - remove the dot at the end of the article title.

Response 2: Thanks, it has been corrected.

Point 3. Lines 91,92, 96, 97, 121 – please change font size. Please check the font size throughout the work.

Response 3: Thanks, it has been corrected.

Point 4. There is no data sources under the tables.

Response 4: I am not sure about this comments, which table do we need to improve?

Point 5. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets [ ], and placed before the punctuation; for example [1], [1–3] or [1,3].

Response 5: thanks, the reference numbers have been corrected.

Point 6. The References section is not prepared according to the Instructions for Authors e.g. Bowman, C.M.; Landee, F.A.; Reslock, M.A. Chemically Oriented Storage and Retrieval System. 1. Storage and Verification of Structural Information. J. Chem. Doc. 1967, 7, 43-47; DOI:10.1021/c160024a013.

Response 6: thanks, the reference numbers has been corrected.

Reviewer 4 Report

The paper is interesting for its topic and for the area of reference, China. It is useful to learn more about the sustainability of production.

 

To improve the paper, I only make a few observations:

 

• revise the rules for in-text citations, these should not be noted at the end of the text but should be referred to with [1]
• in 2.2. "Data collection" (line 101), the average size of the company invested in the individual crops and the production direction, i.e. monoculture or polyculture, should be indicated, because this has an influence on costs;
• What is plastic film used for? To mulch the soil? The cost of disposing of plastic after cultivation should be assessed because plastic certainly has an impact on sustainability;
• In 2.5 "Environmental assessment" (line 141) GHG emissions have been determined using life cycle assessment (LCA). The LCA, however, requires a precise definition of the functional unit and is not mentioned in the text. As well as the Inventory table that shows all the resource uses, the system boundaries (e.g. cradle-to-grave), the sensitivity analysis to verify the accuracy of the data and their influence on the final result, which database was used for comparisons (e.g. international ecoinvent database);
• In table 2 a few things should be clarified. The costs do not contain taxes, interest on capital, compensation for land (interest or rent, depending on the title of ownership). Then why does irrigation have the same cost? What does it refer to? Does Machinery only include depreciation? But what about maintenance costs?

In conclusion, the limitations of the study and future research developments should be indicated. With regard to fertilisation, why not propose preliminary soil analyses to help farmers define a precise fertilisation plan?

 

Good work

Author Response

Point 1. revise the rules for in-text citations, these should not be noted at the end of the text but should be referred to with [1].

Response 1: Thanks, the reference numbers have been corrected.

Point 2.in 2.2. "Data collection" (line 101), the average size of the company invested in the individual crops and the production direction, i.e. monoculture or polyculture, should be indicated, because this has an influence on costs;

Response 2: Thanks for your comments, we mentioned that smallholder farmers were interviewed.

Point 3.What is plastic film used for? To mulch the soil? The cost of disposing of plastic after cultivation should be assessed because plastic certainly has an impact on sustainability;

Response 3: Thanks for your comments, we already mentioned that plastic film were used for mulch the soil. We fully agree with you, plastic film has an impact on sustainability; but our study focused on the four indicators (energy use efficiency, net profit, GHG emissions and RNL). We added a new section “Caveats of the study”, in this section, we mentioned that plastic film might affect the sustainability and addressed the limitations of our indicators.

Point 4. In 2.5 "Environmental assessment" (line 141) GHG emissions have been determined using life cycle assessment (LCA). The LCA, however, requires a precise definition of the functional unit and is not mentioned in the text. As well as the Inventory table that shows all the resource uses, the system boundaries (e.g. cradle-to-grave), the sensitivity analysis to verify the accuracy of the data and their influence on the final result, which database was used for comparisons (e.g. international ecoinvent database);

Response 4: Thanks a lot. Sorry for misleading, we rewrote the method of calculation of GHG emissions.

Point 5. In table 2 a few things should be clarified. The costs do not contain taxes, interest on capital, compensation for land (interest or rent, depending on the title of ownership). Then why does irrigation have the same cost? What does it refer to? Does Machinery only include depreciation? But what about maintenance costs?

Response 5: Thank you so much, we clarified above information in the new version.

Point 6. In conclusion, the limitations of the study and future research developments should be indicated. With regard to fertilisation, why not propose preliminary soil analyses to help farmers define a precise fertilisation plan?

Response 6: Thank you very much for your comments. The conclusion has been rewritten, and preliminary soil analyses were proposed.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors addressed all the issues mentioned in my previous report and the manuscript has been improved significantly. I believe that the revised manuscript is suitable for publication in "Sustainability".