Identification of Soil Erosion-Based Degraded Land Areas by Employing a Geographic Information System—A Case Study of Pakistan for 1990–2020
, Syeda Maria Ali 1, Ashfaq Ahmad Shah 2,3, Kanwar Muhammad Javed Iqbal 4, Wahid Ullah 5 and Muhammad Atiq Ur Rehman Tariq 6,7,*
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments on research paper.
Under ‘discussion’ adding some references and comparisons with your results will add value tom the research paper.
Specific Comments:
Line 31: Replace spelling of Sind with ‘Sindh’.
Line 47: Explain what do you mean by social system of human?
Line 86: Replace Km2 with ‘Km2’.
Line 86-89: Rephrase the sentence. ‘Pakistan is degraded’?…..please write with clarity.
Line 91-93: Rephrase the sentence.
Line 95-97: Rephrase the sentence.
Line 98: KP? Stands for what?
Line 143-145: replace caption of figure 3 with ‘Figure 3. Climatic Zones of Pakistan (Source: [21]’
Provide reference for source in Reference list
Line 158-159: ‘This satellite has spatial resolution of 300 m and provides the best land use land cover maps’. Please justify why this is the best dataset?
Line 173-176: remove a), b)….from the sentence.
Line 201: Insert comma ‘In present study, pair wise..’
Author Response
Thank you for reviewing our manuscript. The detailed response to point by point comments of reviewer 1 is attached herewith.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
sustainability-1897188-peer-review-v1
The manuscript “Identification of soil erosion-based land degraded areas by employing geographic information system – a case study of Pakistan for 1990-2020” addresses an interesting and up-to-date subject, which adheres to Sustainability journal policies, but the current text needs additional work and attention before consideration of publication.
The manuscript tackles an interesting topic related to erosion and LULC changes in Pakistan over a large period of time. Unfortunately, the novelty is quite low, as there are numerous similar articles. Given the fact that not every article can have high novelty, then the manuscript must present a good case study and have a good methodology. Thus, in order for this manuscript to have future chances of publication, the authors must improve everything substantially. Some recommendations:
- Abstract and Introduction must be improved. There are some repetitions between the two, and also more concrete results in Abstract. The Introduction can have more information and citations
- English improvements and template formatting throughout the text
- Fig. 3 is deformed
- R158 “Land use land cover maps were prepared by using ESACCI satellite data. This satellite has spatial resolution of 300 m and provides the best land use land cover maps” 300 m resolution is very low and it is not the best LULC map. It is acceptable, but far from the best. Please change in the text
- Fig. 4 must be improved, as it is a very important collage of maps/figs. Enlarge each of the 11 factors, improve the legend with units, north direction, scale bar, grid lines etc
- Given the fact that you have a Discussion chapter, change chapter 3 only to Results
- There cannot be citations in Conclusion. Improve Discussion and Conclusion chapters, as some parts from Conclusion belong to Discussion.
- Is there any way of validation for the degradation map obtained?
Author Response
Thank you for reviewing our manuscript. The detailed response to point by point comments of reviewer 2 is attached herewith.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This manuscript reported an interesting result. There are some comments authors should address.
Introduction: Objectives were not clearly described.
M&M: 1) Resolution of Fig.3 is too low. 2) In Fig.4, there are regions with soil bulk density of 0 in Zone A. Why? 3) There is lack of dynamics of land degradation from 1990-2020.
Author Response
Thank you for reviewing our manuscript. The detailed response to point by point comments of reviewer 3 is attached herewith.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors improved the article, thus increasing the presentation and relevancy. Some additional attention is required, as some figure layouts can be corrected.
