Characteristics and Driving Factors of Nitrogen-Use Efficiency in Chinese Greenhouse Tomato Cultivation
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper looks well organized and presented, but my main issue is the referencing format and the need to add some citations in some places/arguments/statements/sentences. Second, I am skeptical of how this sentence in your Introduction section could be true using "household" survey data:
"Based on the household survey data from 1965 to 2019, the average mineral nitrogen application rate was 656 kg N ha-1, which is used over tomato demand and led to more reactive nitrogen loss, higher environmental cost, and lower nitrogen use efficiency [6, 7]."
Please see my comments on the manuscript.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Q: The paper looks well organized and presented, but my main issue is the referencing format and the need to add some citations in some places/arguments/statements/sentences. Second, I am skeptical of how this sentence in your Introduction section could be true using "household" survey data: "Based on the household survey data from 1965 to 2019, the average mineral nitrogen application rate was 656 kg N ha-1, which is used over tomato demand and led to more reactive nitrogen loss, higher environmental cost, and lower nitrogen use efficiency [6, 7]."
Re: Thank you for your comments and suggestions. For the first suggestion, we have rechecked the referencing format as required by the journal. As you mentioned in Q6-8, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and China Knowledge Resource Integrated Database are the global public databases. Therefore, we have provided the relevant websites to prove these databases. This practice refers to a number of published high-quality literatures, e.g: (1) Hou E, Luo Y, Kuang Y, et al. Global meta-analysis shows pervasive phosphorus limitation of aboveground plant production in natural terrestrial ecosystems. Nature Communications, 2020, 11(1); (2) Cai A, Liang G, Yang W, et al. Patterns and driving factors of litter decomposition across Chinese terrestrial ecosystems. Journal of Cleaner Production, 2020, 278:123964; (3) Zhou Z, Wang C, Luo Y. Meta-analysis of the impacts of global change factors on soil microbial diversity and functionality. Nature Communications, 2020, 11(1). For the second suggestion, the "household survey data" has been changed as "data of published papers" according to the reference of our cite. Thanks again.
Q1: I am suggesting that the topic is too long unnecessarily
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Q2: Add a p-value here, if available
Re: We have rewritten the sentence and have not added the p-value because we do not compare the difference between MN and MON. Thank you for your suggestion.
Q3: I am skeptical of how this household survey data (methodology) was used to express the average mineral nitrogen application rate
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q4: Suggestion: may be put reference 3 here: [3]
Re: Done.
Q5: Suggestion: can we use another word here, e.g., quicker reaction
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Q6: Cite this as [23] and put the reference at the end of the paper with other references
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q7: Same as above, put at the end of paper
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q8: Put at the end of paper
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q9: Which table or text, need to rewrite this sentence to make it more meaningful
Re: We have rewritten the sentence as “if the experimental data in the target literature was presented by the form of Tables and Text, we can directly obtain the experimental data”.
Q10: Re-arrange all references from here to the rest of the paper, and this one should be reference [26]
Re: Thanks for your remind. See the answer to first question (Q). Therefore, we only changed the list of references which we have added or deleted.
Q11: Why US dollars (year value ??), and not Chinese Yuan since the study focuses on China.
Re: Thanks for your good suggestion. U.S. dollar was retained after consulting some experts. Because the article is for internationalization and the U.S. dollar is the most common currency in the world. If we adopt Chinese Yuan, it will cause inconvenience to international readers.
Q12: Put citation number here like [2x] and reference it in the back
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q13: Do same as above
Re: See the answer to first question (Q).
Q14: Any names of cities/towns/other locations we can mention here
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Q15: 41+32=63 studies, and not 64 as you claimed above
Re: You are right. Some studies have included both MN and MON treatments in one paper.
Q16-22: I do not think this is a proper way of citation, you should write the name of all authors instead of (Kuscu et al.,)
Re: Thank you for your comments and suggestions. We have rechecked the referencing format as required by the journal.
Reviewer 2 Report
The manuscript is interesting but written clumsily. It can be considered after revision. Some hints for authors.
- Please add a source of data from line 54
Please specify the uniqueness of Chinese soil? Why do You limit Your discussion to Chinese soil? Why do You choose greenhouse cultivation of tomatoes as the subject of Your research, not overall tomato cultivation? - In the introduction, the statement lines 79-86 do not have support on references. Please add more information if such review were written to other countries is so compare it.
- Please lines 132-138 write in the same style as in the other part of the text. Consider dividing long sentences into shorter ones there for clarity of text
- Please specify at Soil properties which kind of anthrosols You use (hortisols or rigosols, or others)?
- Maybe discuss not only on China case. Please compare with other countries' results. Please consider putting them on the table
- In 278 after suggested that should semicolons be before enumeration.
- Many references do not have doi please write them in agreement to the journal scope
Author Response
Q: The manuscript is interesting but written clumsily. It can be considered after revision. Some hints for authors.
Re: Thank you for your comments. We have made revision one by one according to your suggestions.
Q1: Please add a source of data from line 54
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Q2: Please specify the uniqueness of Chinese soil? Why do You limit Your discussion to Chinese soil? Why do you choose greenhouse cultivation of tomatoes as the subject of Your research, not overall tomato cultivation?
Re: For the first question, the uniqueness of Chinese soil was described in Materials and methods. For the second question, in the relevant section of Discussion, we have added comparisons with other countries' results. For the second question, nitrogen use efficiency of field tomato has been reported.
Li H, Mei X, Wang J, et al. Drip fertigation significantly increased crop yield, water productivity and nitrogen use efficiency with respect to traditional irrigation and fertilization practices: A meta-analysis in China. Agricultural Water Management, 2021, 244: 106534.
Q3: In the introduction, the statement lines 79-86 do not have support on references. Please add more information if such review were written to other countries is so compare it.
Re: Thank you for your good suggestions. We have added some results of previous research and pointed out that the nitrogen use efficiency under different nitrogen fertilizer form was no reported at the regional scale. The logic of manuscript is smoother by the modification. Thanks again.
Q4: Please lines 132-138 write in the same style as in the other part of the text. Consider dividing long sentences into shorter ones there for clarity of text
Re: Done as your suggestion. The average price of tomato was 0.72 USD kg-1. The average price of urea, slowly controlled release fertilizer, diammonium phosphate, water-soluble fertilizer, and organic fertilizer was 0.29, 0.65, 0.35, 0.32, 1.61, and 0.10 USD kg-1, respectively. The price was obtained from Chinese food information network (http://www.grain.gov.cn/Grain/Wheat.aspx) and China's fertilizer network (http://www.fert.cn/).
Q5: Please specify at Soil properties which kind of anthrosols You use (hortisols or rigosols, or others)?
Re: Done as your suggestion. The anthrosols of our study include hortisols, rigosols, and paddy soil.
Q6: Maybe discuss not only on China case. Please compare with other countries' results. Please consider putting them on the table
Re: You are right. Thanks for your suggestion. In the relevant section of Discussion, we have added comparisons with other countries' results.
Q7: In 278 after suggested that should semicolons be before enumeration.
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Q8: Many references do not have doi please write them in agreement to the journal scope
Re: Thank you for your suggestions. We have rechecked the referencing format in agreement to the journal scope. The journal does not require the doi.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Manuscript still needs much revisions.
Authors only responded for some questions. They do not improved according to some suggestions.
- In the introduction,. Please add more information if such review were written to other countries is so compare it. Please specify the uniqueness of Chinese soil? Why do You limit Your discussion to Chinese soil? Why do You choose greenhouse cultivation of tomatoes as the subject of Your research, not overall tomato cultivation?
- Please lines 132-138 write in the same style as in the other part of the text. Consider dividing long sentences into shorter ones there for clarity of text
- Please specify at Soil properties which kind of anthrosols You use (hortisols or rigosols, or others)?
- Maybe discuss not only on China case. Please compare with other countries' results. Please consider putting them on the table Authors compared only with Kenya do not put on table
- In 278 after suggested that should semicolons be before enumeration.
- Many references do not have doi please write them in agreement to the journal scope
Author Response
1 In the introduction. Please add more information if such review were written to other countries is so compare it. Please specify the uniqueness of Chinese soil? Why do You limit Your discussion to Chinese soil? Why do You choose greenhouse cultivation of tomatoes as the subject of Your research, not overall tomato cultivation?
Re: For the first question, tomato production in China increased from 50.7 million tons in 2013 to 61.6 million tons in 2018, and more than half of tomato production came from greenhouse cultivation (Introduction), China has taken into account the effects of the combined application of mineral and organic nitrogen in the sustainable production of greenhouse tomatoes. We made that very clear in the Introduction. Therefore, our research is about Chinese tomatoes. For the second question, according to the references, nearly half of the references are from other countries. We did not introduce China only in the Introduction. For the third question, nitrogen use efficiency of field tomato has been reported (Li H, Mei X, Wang J, et al. Drip fertigation significantly increased crop yield, water productivity and nitrogen use efficiency with respect to traditional irrigation and fertilization practices: A meta-analysis in China. Agricultural Water Management, 2021, 244: 106534.). Therefore, we choose greenhouse cultivation of tomatoes as the subject of our research.
2 Please lines 132-138 write in the same style as in the other part of the text. Consider dividing long sentences into shorter ones there for clarity of text
Re: Done as your suggestion. The average price of tomato was 0.72 USD kg-1. The average price of urea, slowly controlled release fertilizer, diammonium phosphate, water-soluble fertilizer, and organic fertilizer was 0.29, 0.65, 0.35, 0.32, 1.61, and 0.10 USD kg-1, respectively. The price was obtained from Chinese food information network (http://www.grain.gov.cn/Grain/Wheat.aspx) and China's fertilizer network (http://www.fert.cn/).
3 Please specify at Soil properties which kind of anthrosols You use (hortisols or rigosols, or others)?
Re: Done in the Materials and Methods. The anthrosols of our study include hortisols, rigosols, and paddy soil.
4 Maybe discuss not only on China case. Please compare with other countries' results. Please consider putting them on the table Authors compared only with Kenya do not put on table
Re: We have added comparisons with other countries' results, such as India, Kenya, Florida, Spain.
5 In 278 after suggested that should semicolons be before enumeration.
Re: Done as your suggestion.
6 Many references do not have doi please write them in agreement to the journal scope
Re: Done as your suggestion.
Round 3
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors responded to most of my questions. But Figures 6 and 7 do not have proper files. Please put in Figures 6 and 7 proper illustrations, for assessing the recent quality of paper
Author Response
Thank you for your good suggestion. We have modified the fonts and pixels in Figures 6 and 7. The legend in Figure 7 has also been repositioned. If editing is required, we can also provide the original image or higher pixel image
