Can Crop Insurance Encourage Farmers to Adopt Environmentally Friendly Agricultural Technology—The Evidence from Shandong Province in China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

I thank the authors for giving me the opportunity to read their interesting paper.
I have no relevant comments on the structure of the work, but I suggest some additions:
- better specify the survey method: how were the farms identified? How were the farmers interviewed (face to face, or other methods)? Did they receive a fee for participating in the interview? in what period of time did it take place?
- better specify the representativeness of the sample, how many farmsare there in the area?
- I would integrate the bibliography with other studies in international journals or using other source concerning the issues:

e.g.:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305877732_Does_Federal_Crop_Insurance_Make_Environmental_Externalities_from_Agriculture_Worse

https://foodandagpolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2021/06/AGree_SynthesisCropInsurancePaper.pdf

http://repiica.iica.int/docs/B3118i/B3118i.pdf

https://www.ifad.org/documents/36783902/40278505/S08_Rispoli_IFAD+%28ppt+02.05%29.pdf/618fffd8-4a30-43e4-9a41-04de9d2f5efb

- I would emphasize in the conclusions the comparison with other studies, if available, and the limited sample size as reasons for expanding the survey for the future.

Author Response

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Reviewer 2 Report

In the Introduction, the authors presented an introduction to the subject. They also did a very brief literature review. The Introduction section is deficient. It does not contain all the necessary elements. The aim of the work has not been precisely and clearly defined. You should also provide a research hypothesis or research questions. The hypotheses appeared, but in a different section. The Introduction section should present the goals of the work and research questions (before summarizing the content of the article).
When summarizing the contents of an article, it is better to use the names section than Part (lines 61-66).
The layout of the work is incorrect. The hypotheses are missing in section 1 of the Introduction. This is where the hypotheses come in.
Section 2. Materials and Methods is not appropriate. The title of this section does not match the content. This content should be presented in section 1. Introduction.
Section 3 is called Data. The content should be in section 2. Materials and Methods. I do not understand why the authors separated such a section 3. Date.
Subsection 3.2. Data description contains the test results. They should be presented in the Results section.
Section 3.3. Questionnaire design should appear in section 2. Materials and Methods. Alternatively, Table 2 should be included in the appendix at the end of the article.
Section 4 title is inappropriate (Econometric Models and Test). This content should be in part in section 2 (with the description of methods) and in part in the section Results (with test results provided).
The authors write a bit vaguely (lines 282-283): "... Thus, hypotheses H1, H2, and H3 are all 282 verified ...". It must be stated whether the hypothesis has been verified positively or negatively.
Non-standard coefficient and standard coefficient had low values ​​in many cases. I am concerned about the credibility of these accounts. The research sample was small. The authors rightly write that the results are not representative. With a larger sample, the results could have been different. Additionally, there are many very small farms in the sample. Their production scale is very small. The selection of test objects also raises doubts. All this means that the inference based on the obtained results is error-prone.
Section 6 is entitled Discussion and Conclusions. In my opinion, these parts need to be separated. I understand a discussion as referring to other studies after presenting my research results. In my opinion, doing research without a clear comparison and reference to other research results in the fact that the obtained results cannot be properly assessed. This part should follow the Results section. There should be a separate Discussion section.
Section 5. Conclusion is not correct. Applications should be more specific. The conclusions can be bulleted. You must certainly refer to the hypotheses set at work. Restrictions on the tests performed should be given. Future research directions for other scientists should also be indicated. What should be the next tests.
Abbreviation RMB is in Table 1. What it means is nowhere explained. My guess is it's an abbreviation for Chinese currency. An article in an international journal should be based on the units of currency used internationally (USD, EUR). Alternatively, please provide a RMB to USD conversion rate. As it stands, I do not know if these units mean a lot of income.
Very few literature items were used in the article. Only 21 items of literature is not enough for a high IF journal.

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

The topic covered in the article is interesting as well as the modeling used, in fact, both the validation and the model coefficients are well described. However, in my opinion several things need to be better explained, in particular:

• table 2 - questionnaire: about the observed variables is not clear on the basis of what thay have been constructed and where they come from: is from the analysis of the literature or from an analysis of the authors or other? It should be explained and made explicit.
• There is no indication of the estimation method used, is the maximum likelihood? It’s better to specify it.
• Figure 1: if e3-e8 are correlated, it follows that m1-a2 are also correlated, if e2-e4 are also correlated so even m2-o3 are, but nothing is said about such correlations. They should be better explained both theoretically and numerically because they result important for the model.
• Model 1 (Figure 2) and Model 2 (Figure 3):
• is necessary to show the indicators of adaptation because at the moment they seem to be missed;
• is not clear how the 2 models were constructed: it is because they eliminate the opportunity and ability variables, respectively? It needs to be explained but, above all, in our opinion, they should be included in the model because this type of model analyzes the interactions between variables, so why omit one of them?
• it is necessary to describe how the multiplier factor was created;
• mo (item from figure 2 and table 8) "interaction" needs to be explained better. Why does it take on a negative value? Perhaps because the model is poorly specified since a variable is missing; in any case negative value should be explained;
• what happened to the correlations highlighted in figure 1 (e3-e8, e2-e4)? Is necessary to explain why they disappear.

I hope that my suggestions help you to improve the article that I found very interesting and innovative.

Author Response

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Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors made a lot of corrections. I still have a comment on the Conclusions section. It has not actually been modified. I suggested that the conclusions should be scored. Then they are more visible. This still needs to be changed.
I also have a note regarding the marking of changes in the text. Please do not use yellow or any other bright text color in the future. With this color, the text is difficult to see. I had to make an effort to read this text.

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

thank you very much for the explaination and examples that you provided in the cover letter, they are exhaustive. However, I found that not all the comments that you provided have been included in the final version, therefore I suggest to include also them in the text and after that, in my opinion, the paper should be more complete. Best regards

Author Response

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