Recommendation of Good Practice in the Food-Processing Industry for Preventing and Handling Food Loss and Waste

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

There are some issues such as research questions and hypothesis which should be in my opinion placed at the end of introduction.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The pandemic crisis generated by COVID19 has changed the behaviour of Food-processing companies related to food loss and waste. For this reason, I consider that the article should be extended with an analysis of the research published in 2020 and 2021. The authors mentioned three sources published in 2020, but these sources are not so relevant to the findings of this article.

The methodology is another weakness of the paper. I suggest adding more details regarding the research data collection, analysis, and interpretation of results and providing a brief description of the methods of data employed and their application and appropriateness for data analysis.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Editor,

The article points to the need to define good practice recommendations for the management of waste generated throughout the supply chain from supplier to consumer and beyond. The low response from the companies involved in the research shows that they need to be aware of the importance of waste prevention and management. The topic is actual and important for the development of a modern food processing industry focused on sustainability, including circular bioeconomy concepts and ethical aspects.

I suggest minor revision as follows:

 

• Page 1, r. 37: When an abbreviation is mentioned for the first time, the full name should also be written.
• Page 2, r. 46: Insert abbreviation after Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
• Page 17, r. 653-654: Use abbreviation SDG instead Sustainable Development Goal
• Table 3, Table 5, Table 6, Table 8, and Appendix. It is not clear what should be under the Reference column. Company abbreviations are given, but no references. Please check all tables in the manuscript and add correct reference in the tables where it is missing.

Author Response

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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper was improved but still did not consider more of my previous recommendations.

Many affirmations are without support, starting from the Abstract section until the Conclusion.

For example, p. 1, r.26-31: "Some companies are involved already along the entire supplier chain. Finally, the results show that even ethical aspects must also be considered to reduce food waste in addition to any economic considerations. This paper highlights important stages and basic recommendations for companies, how they can address the issue of food loss and waste to improve their practices. ".

The sentences need English corrections - I suggest, but is not limited to "This paper highlights important stages and basic recommendations for companies and how they can address food loss and waste to improve their practices."

The paper only presents the results of the other scholars without critically analysing them.

The critical analysis should be underlined in the following sections: 2.4. Data analysis and elaboration of recommendations; 3. Results, and 4. Discussion. These sections have to clearly present the answer to the three questions mentioned on page 5.

I did not find the answer to the following question: What is the paper's contribution to the research field?

Good luck!

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 3

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper was improved, but I suggest paying attention to the citation of the sources without critical analysis.

The same source is cited many times and is not necessary. For example, when p. 13, r. 467 ; "[3,8,19,33,36,42,58,76,79]"; p. 13, r. 480 "[9,16,34,35,38,43,44,46–48,50,19,51,53,58,73,74,20,23–25,31,33]" and so on. 

The same citations are in Table 6. Recommendations for internal management at company level.

I suggest making the article easy to follow and give clear answers to the three research questions.

 

Good luck!

 

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 2 Comments (3)

Point 1:

The paper was improved, but I suggest paying attention to the citation of the sources without critical analysis. The same source is cited many times and is not necessary. For example, when p. 13, r. 467 ; "[3,8,19,33,36,42,58,76,79]"; p. 13, r. 480 "[9,16,34,35,38,43,44,46–48,50,19,51,53,58,73,74,20,23–25,31,33]" and so on. The same citations are in Table 6. Recommendations for internal management at company level.

 

Response 1:

We implemented this aspect in the following sections.

Page 13, Line 749

Page 13, Line 762

Page 19, Line 1180

Page 20, Line 1303

 

 

Point 2:

I suggest making the article easy to follow and give clear answers to the three research questions.

 

Response 2:

That is a valuable and good suggestion. Therefore, we improved our structure by adding more subheadings in the introduction and discussion. Afterwards, the answers to the RQs are made clear in the discussion yet. You will find the answers for RQ (ii) at Page 18, Line 1075-1077, for RQ (iii) Line 1082-1084, and RQ (i) Line 1085-1087.

 

Page 2, Line 100

Page 3, Line 146

Page 19, Line 1177

Page 20, Line 1300

 

We highly appreciated your advices, which really improved our manuscript.