Vulnerability Assessment of Pacific Whiteleg Shrimp (Penaeus vannamei) Farms and Vendors in Davao, Philippines Using FishVool

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This study assessed the perception of vulnerability to climate change in small-scale shrimp farmers (Penaeus vannamei) (n=39) and shrimp vendors (48) from different places and markets in the Philippines (Davao Gulf) by interviewing them (key informants) considering parameters of the Fisheries vulnerability tool (FishVool) such as exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. The authors rightly point out (conclusions and recommendations) the study is an opportunity "to strengthen the capacity of farmers for adaptation to climate change, and hence to provide a sustainable food production and security in favor of local communities depending on this aquatic resource"

Having said that, authors should make an effort to highlight the originality and academic soundness of the article. For example:

1. A theoretical background (state of the art) should be provided in the introduction as well as a scientifically sound hypothesis whose rejection or acceptance may contribute new knowledge regarding the impact of climate change on low-scale aquaculture and the trade of aquatic species/products.

2. Emphasize what is original regarding similar articles. This is needed to make the article appealing to either specialists on sustainability or the broad audience of the journal.  

3.   A more in-depth discussion is needed in the introduction or the discussion section on how vulnerability assessment allows understanding the interactions between natural systems, pressures and threats, and how this translates into practical policy improvement. Any significant examples in the literature?

4. Likewise, the limitations and pros of the Fisheries Assessment Tool should be discussed. Any relevant example of a successful application of this tool into policy?

5. If key informants are relevant for the interview, please clarify how they were selected (section M & M). In the discussion, one can read that farmers have a low understanding of climate change which may explain the result on their low adaptive capacity. 

6. The results of the interview certainly overlap (or are affected by) with the Covid pandemic, thus, this factor needs further consideration in evaluating the results and their practical contribution.

Author Response

Questions and Answers 1. A theoretical background (state of the art) should be provided in the introduction as well as a scientifically sound hypothesis whose rejection or acceptance may contribute new knowledge regarding the impact of climate change on low-scale aquaculture and the trade of aquatic species/products. I think the introduction regarding climate change impacts and the shrimp fisheries in the Philippines were already state of the art. 2. Emphasize what is original regarding similar articles. This is needed to make the article appealing to either specialists on sustainability or the broad audience of the journal. This is the first vulnerability assessment conducted in shrimp aquaculture. There were modifications undertaken in the methodology to differentiate it from other studies. The FishVool tool was effective in assessing the fisheries vulnerability status, has become an efficient tool in assessing and quantifying the vulnerability status of shrimp farming in Mati City. 3. A more in-depth discussion is needed in the introduction or the discussion section on how vulnerability assessment allows understanding the interactions between natural systems, pressures and threats, and how this translates into practical policy improvement. Any significant examples in the literature? Vulnerability assessment dwells on the climate-related incidents and impacts that could alter any form of livelihood and farming practices beneficial to people. This will help investigate reason for certain causes of disruption on their livelihood. In terms of policy adjustment, the Department of Agriculture has in fact adopted various measures identified previously to be potential impacts of climate change variabilities such as drought and more frequent storms, therefore increased capacitation is the challenge of the government to adapt to these increasing or more frequent extreme events or environmental changes. 4. Likewise, the limitations and pros of the Fisheries Assessment Tool should be discussed. Any relevant example of a successful application of this tool into policy? Through this assessment, policymakers will then be able to establish ways to uplift shrimp farming and become competent in terms of livelihoods. This will promote sustainable revenues for the farmers and encourage allied agencies to support the shrimp farming sector. BFAR through its research arm NFRDI has in fact adopted this tool and used it for assessment of various fisheries commodities as mentioned in Jacinto et al., 2015 and De Chavez et al., 2021 5. If key informants are relevant for the interview, please clarify how they were selected (section M & M). In the discussion, one can read that farmers have a low understanding of climate change which may explain the result on their low adaptive capacity. Farmers were chosen according to their availability and willingness to participate. Most of the farmers interviewed were farm operators or laborers who were not familiar enough with climate change. They also don’t experience any seminars or training to deeply understand and evaluate this matter. The farming practices they apply were based on their own experiences and understanding of their co-workers or from other personnel like technicians. 6. The results of the interview certainly overlap (or are affected by) with the Covid pandemic, thus, this factor needs further consideration in evaluating the results and their practical contribution. Due to pandemic, the number of shrimp farmers dominating the area was reduced. Some of the farmers stopped culturing shrimps because they lack finances and most of the farmers lost their capital when the lockdown happened. They were not allowed to travel and deliver their shrimps to their market destinations. Due to these phenomena, the farmers decided to stop culturing shrimp and find another way to sustain their needs. The pandemic has brought too much devastation not just to the people’s health but mostly livelihood.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This study is a good subject matter, which is very helpful for academic and industrial development. But I cannot confirm the contribution of this study because the author did not explain the research method very well. For most readers, the assessment tools used in this study may be unfamiliar, so it is necessary for the authors to fully describe the entire methodology. In a nutshell, how does this study calculate the parameters, how to choose the parameters, and how to define the levels of M, L, and H?

In this stage, I can't evaluate this study until the authors fully address these issues.

Author Response

Questions and Answers for vulnerability assessment of shrimp farming

Reviewer 1
Questions	Answers
This study is a good subject matter, which is very helpful for academic and industrial development. But I cannot confirm the contribution of this study because the author did not explain the research method very well. For most readers, the assessment tools used in this study may be unfamiliar, so it is necessary for the authors to fully describe the entire methodology. In a nutshell, how does this study calculate the parameters, how to choose the parameters, and how to define the levels of M, L, and H?	=This was modified in lines 147-161, the various criteria were each discussed or mentioned under the different vulnerability components e.g. sensitivity, exposure, and adaptive capacity. This is true for both farm vulnerability or market vulnerability. Moreover the scoring guide was also included as Table 1 as well as the rubrics as Tables 2 and 3 which will be used once the overall scores for sensitivity and exposure and adaptive capacity was determined from the scoring of the various criteria using the scoring guide found in Table 1. The potential impact comes from the result of the rubric between sensitivity and exposure while the vulnerability result comes from the result of the rubric between potential impact and adaptive capacity. This utilizes the rubric which looks more like a punnet square. All changes in the manuscript were in yellow. Thus we have added 4 Tables to refer the reader to them in the Methods section to help them compute or redo the work, in addition to the publication of Jacinto et al., 2015  and Chavez et al., 2021 which the reader is referred to when conducting the same study.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

1. The abstract mentions that the Philippine shrimp industry is affected by marine pollution, disease, and climate change. However, the research only evaluates the shrimp industry’s vulnerability in terms of climate change. Meanwhile, the scope of the discussion and conclusions extends to the impact of COVID-19 on the industry. It is recommended to confirm the overall structure of the manuscript.
2. The research scope mainly focused on Davao Region, which has 10 major cities in total. Its samples include 39 shrimp farmers and 48 ​​market vendors. It is recommended that additional explanations be provided regarding the city distribution of the samples, survey period, and sampling method. Further, L.281 & L.372 mentions that shrimp farmers mostly live in Mati city.
3. Can you provide additional explanations on the farming scale of shrimp farmers? What is the difference in scale for small-scale farming mentioned in L.301?
4. In L.205, it is stated that the value of AC is 1.6, which appears to be a typographical error. Kindly verify and correct this value.
5. The information in Table 2 has already appeared in Table 1. Kindly delete Table 2 to avoid redundancy.
6. Can you explain why the exposure is “medium” in the Panabo and Sta. Cruz areas as shown in Figure 1 & Table 4?
7. In reference to L.230, will the assessment of vulnerability be affected if vendors have little experience selling shrimps or if their income is not entirely dependent on the shrimp sales revenue?

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Questions and Answers for vulnerability assessment of shrimp farming

Reviewer 3
Questions	Answers
The abstract mentions that the Philippine shrimp industry is affected by marine pollution, disease, and climate change. However, the research only evaluates the shrimp industry’s vulnerability in terms of climate change. Meanwhile, the scope of the discussion and conclusions extends to the impact of COVID-19 on the industry. It is recommended to confirm the overall structure of the manuscript.	=We have also removed the reference regarding marine pollution and diseases….in the abstract: The impacts of climate change on shrimp aquaculture can vary widely and can have environmental and socioeconomic consequences. This study assessed the vulnerability to climate change impacts of selected small-scale shrimp farms of Penaeus vannamei and shrimpfish market vendors in Davao region, Philippines using a modified Fisheries Vulnerability Assessment Tool (FishVool). =We have removed the sentence referring to the impacts of COVID-19 on the industry and this was not really meant to assess that.
2.     The research scope mainly focused on Davao Region, which has 10 major cities in total. Its samples include 39 shrimp farmers and 48 ​​market vendors. It is recommended that additional explanations be provided regarding the city distribution of the samples, survey period, and sampling method. Further, L.281 & L.372 mentions that shrimp farmers mostly live in Mati city.	Yes, these areas are populated by 5 major cities and the samples were low compared to the expected number of farmers. However shrimp farming is really capital intensive and requires prior knowledge as well as specific land topography for it to allow culturing of shrimps without endangering the risks of financial catastrophe. In Mati, the area remains favorable as this has a large coastal area that is unexposed and still with large mangrove swathes compared to Panabo or Tagum or Davao or Pantukan. The presence of P vannamei fish farmers in Mati has something to do more with the start of a few farmers of shrimp that were trained by technicians in the past and learned how to grow their farms in size and culture methods. Afterwards, new business partners arrived or invested with others for it is financial capital. Thus, we found that in the Davao region, Mati City has the most number of small-scale shrimp farmers.
Can you provide additional explanations on the farming scale of shrimp farmers? What is the difference in scale for small-scale farming mentioned in L.301?	The scalability mentioned here has something to do with size of the area cultivated, the tools or technology used and the intensity of culture methods. For a small-scale, the shrimp fish farmers of Mati City are small (0.3 to 3ha) compared to the commercial shrimp farmers that can go beyond 3 or 5 hectares up to 50ha, used highly intensive culturing methods and are powered by paddlewheels and even oxygen blowers.
In L.205, it is stated that the value of AC is 1.6, which appears to be a typographical error. Kindly verify and correct this value.	Thank you for your suggestion this was modified in lines 275 to 278: Overall average vulnerability assessment score revealed a medium vulnerability. The scores were 2.3 or medium for sensitivity, 1.4 or low for exposure and 2 or low also for adaptive capacity. Moreover, the scores indicated a low (L) potential impact and medium (M) vulnerability for whiteleg shrimp (Penaeus vannamei) in Davao Region (Table 6 and 7).
The information in Table 2 has already appeared in Table 1. Kindly delete Table 2 to avoid redundancy.	=This was already modified including table numbers, as we added more explanation on the scoring of the fishvool tool when applying it to a commodity
Can you explain why the exposure is “medium” in the Panabo and Sta. Cruz areas as shown in Figure 1 & Table 4?	=This was already modified in lines 284 to 293:   For the exposure (E) analysis, the assessment revealed that most of the market places in Davao region have low exposures to weather disturbances and natural hazards which may have been due to better infrastructures or sheltered markets and this could be the same for  their households and their communities (Table 7). These low values indicate that the market place/stall (E1) and household site (E2) and community site (E3), experienced rare (0-2 times) occurrence of weather disturbances in a year, such as typhoons, floods, tidal fluctuations, and etc. Exposure was also categorized to have an indirect and direct effect. In the case of Panabo and Sta. Cruz, the barangay markets examined were located in nearby coastal areas, the shrimp vendors were also living near exposed coastal areas, prompting them to provide answers classified as under medium exposure.
In reference to L.230, will the assessment of vulnerability be affected if vendors have little experience selling shrimps or if their income is not entirely dependent on the shrimp sales revenue?	Yes, basically the vendors that were entirely dependent on shrimp sales are more highy vulnerable compared to vendors selling both shrimp and fish at the same time. However if they have higher adaptive capacity such as education or awareness of selling techniques or sales strategies, then that can offset a lower sales volume as they can learn when, where and how to sell their shrimp by volume or pieces.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

This paper is an examination of the vulnerability of shrimp farms in the Philippines to climate change. The authors found that fish farms varied in their vulnerability to climate change.

The authors have used a robust methodology to investigate the extent of shrimp farmers’ vulnerability to climate change, but their paper raises four issues which they need to address before their paper can be considered for publication.

(1) Is there a serious problem or only a moderate/low problem? At times, the authors give the impression that climate change is a very serious problem for shrimp farmers in parts of the Philippines:  

“Direct effects of climate change include changes in the abundance and distribution of exploited species and assemblages, and the increases in the frequency and severity of extreme events, such as floods and storms, which affect fishing operations and infrastructure this is connected to exposure of cultured species such as P. vannamei [25-28]. Indirect effects of climate change include: first, changes in aquatic habitat quantity and quality, ecosystem productivity and the distribution and abundance of aquatic competitors and predators [29-33]; second is the impacts on other food production sectors that affect people’s food security and livelihoods [31,34-36], and third is the impacts on aspects of people’s lives unrelated to their economic activities, such as diseases or damage to their homes” (lines 263-272)

“The potential impacts of climate change on shrimp farming could have severe effects on food production, export earnings, livelihoods of the coastal poor and their socioeconomic conditions [49]. Shrimp farming is the main source of livelihoods for people living in the coastal region [50]. If the impacts of climate change got deteriorated, a lot of lives will be put into concern” (lines 340-344)

But at other times, the authors appear to say it is a minor problem:

“These values indicate that both shrimp ponds (E1) and household and community (E2) experienced rare (0-2 times) occurrence of weather disturbances, such as typhoons, floods tidal fluctuations” (lines 178-180)

“most shrimp farmers experienced low mortality rate and observed no changes in growth of shrimps in the past 5 years of farming. In terms of other criteria, like water quality, water temperature, water source, and source of fry, those were observed to be on a neutral to medium parameters that ranges from 2-3 times respectively. In addition, the changed in salinity level of the water in the pond was low for the past 5 years” (lines 185-190).

“Exposure (E) analysis revealed that most of the market places in Davao region were low expose to weather disturbances and natural hazards that may occur and either the exposure of their household site and their community (Table 4). These values indicate that the market place/stall (E1) and household site (E2) and community site (E3), experienced rare (0-2 times) occurrence of weather disturbances in a year, such as typhoons, floods, tidal fluctuations” (lines 213-218)

[Vendors] “observed no change of sales or the sold kilogram per day…In terms of the temperature, they haven’t noticed any change of weather in their market place” (lines 229; 232-233)

“most of the vendors haven’t change any of their marketing techniques. It’s just the season and the pandemic that has change the things in the market” (lines 244-245).

“Fortunately, most of the Penaeus vannamei farmers in Mati City observed that the shrimp volume production did not shrink, but also it did not grow. Accordingly, the shrimp farmers were still able to achieved their volume targets including the average weight of the shrimp after a period of culture (e.g 24 g – 30 g / 70-100 days of culture). Under the parameter of sensitivity in the FishVool tool, no growth corresponds to a medium score. Which was the case of the P. vannamei farmers of Mati. dium score. Which was the case of the the P. vannamei farmers of Mati. There were few farmers who answered that there was an increase in the volume of shrimp produced compared five years ago. But predominantly most of the respondents, gave an answer of no observed changes” (lines 281-289)

(2) The authors say it is important to differentiate between the impacts of climate change and the impacts of other threats to shrimp production:

“In order to effectively reduce the risk of current and future disasters, it is important to distinguish what aspects of a given disaster are due to climate change and what aspects are due to other factors leading to vulnerability; such as environment, economic, social or political factors. Incorrectly attributing the cause of a specific disaster, whether it is a direct cause or a fundamental cause, may ultimately increase the vulnerability of the population at risk by taking away focus from the issues that are truly causing he vulnerability” (lines 364-370)

But they fail to provide evidence that the damage done to shrimp farms in the Philippines is due to climate change rather than other causes. For example, they assert on lines 61-63 that  

“Changes in climate variables largely affect the shrimp production and market by increasing frequency of shrimp disease, causing physical damage to farm structure and deteriorating quality of water”.

But where is their evidence for this assertion?

On lines 372-380, they mix up the effects of climate change with the effects of the Covid pandemic:

“Shrimp farming is an essential source of food and livelihood for people living in Mati City. Their culturing of shrimp was medium vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. This indicates a low adaptive capacity of farmers towards the impacts of climate change to their shrimps. Aside from this, farmers were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic which limits them from getting more income. The same was true with the shrimp vendors who encountered difficulties selling their shrimp harvests for the reason of less buyers and less mobility due to the pandemic [56,57]. The shrimps from the farms were sold at lesser prices and this was not good for the farmers because their investments cannot be recouped when prices were down”.

Moreover, the authors do not convincingly explain why it is important to differentiate between climate change impacts and impacts of other threats. On lines 63-67, the authors imply that adaptation techniques will fail if farmers do not understand which threats are from climate change:    

“Shrimp farmers try to adapt to those changes in various ways, including increasing pond depth, exchanging tidal water, strengthening earthen dike and netting and fencing around the dike. However, there is a lack of understanding about the adaptation measures taken by the local shrimp farmers with respect to the emergence of specific impacts from changes of climatic variables”

But if farmers are faced with threats to their shrimp production such as increasing disease or deteriorating water quality, what does it matter whether they attribute such threats to climate change? They have to deal with the threats as best they can whatever their cause.   

(3) In the Discussion section 4, the authors’ focus jumps around from one theme to another. It begins with an account of the direct and indirect effects of climate change (second paragraph). Then it notes that most shrimp farmers in Mali said there was no change in shrimp production (third paragraph). Then it refers to the importance of education in teaching farmers about the environment (fourth paragraph). Then it describes the lack of help given to shrimp farmers by the government (fifth paragraph). Then it talks about possible adaptation strategies (sixth paragraph). Then it discusses the economics of shrimp farming and the harm done to it by the Covid pandemic (seventh paragraph). Then it says how important it is to differentiate the threat of climate change from other threats (eighth paragraph. There is no common thread or consistent argument running through the Discussion section.

(4) In the Conclusion section 5, the authors assert that the government should give more support to shrimp farmers without explaining why, given that the impact of climate change on most shrimp farmers seems to be limited. They also assert that the government should take steps to improve the biosecurity of shrimp farms, but they do not explain what steps should be taken. 

This paper lacks sufficient rigour of analysis to be published. The authors need to clarify precisely what the level of threat from climate change is to shrimp farmers in the Philippines and how it can be differentiated from other threats. Also their Discussion and Conclusion sections need to be re-written in a more coherent fashion 

 

Author Response

Reviewer 2
Questions	Answers
This paper is an examination of the vulnerability of shrimp farms in the Philippines to climate change. The authors found that fish farms varied in their vulnerability to climate change. The authors have used a robust methodology to investigate the extent of shrimp farmers’ vulnerability to climate change, but their paper raises four issues which they need to address before their paper can be considered for publication. (1) Is there a serious problem or only a moderate/low problem? At times, the authors give the impression that climate change is a very serious problem for shrimp farmers in parts of the Philippines:   “Direct effects of climate change include changes in the abundance and distribution of exploited species and assemblages, and the increases in the frequency and severity of extreme events, such as floods and storms, which affect fishing operations and infrastructure this is connected to exposure of cultured species such as P. vannamei [25-28]. Indirect effects of climate change include: first, changes in aquatic habitat quantity and quality, ecosystem productivity and the distribution and abundance of aquatic competitors and predators [29-33]; second is the impacts on other food production sectors that affect people’s food security and livelihoods [31,34-36], and third is the impacts on aspects of people’s lives unrelated to their economic activities, such as diseases or damage to their homes” (lines 263-272) “The potential impacts of climate change on shrimp farming could have severe effects on food production, export earnings, livelihoods of the coastal poor and their socioeconomic conditions [49]. Shrimp farming is the main source of livelihoods for people living in the coastal region [50]. If the impacts of climate change got deteriorated, a lot of lives will be put into concern” (lines 340-344) But at other times, the authors appear to say it is a minor problem: “These values indicate that both shrimp ponds (E1) and household and community (E2) experienced rare (0-2 times) occurrence of weather disturbances, such as typhoons, floods tidal fluctuations” (lines 178-180) “most shrimp farmers experienced low mortality rate and observed no changes in growth of shrimps in the past 5 years of farming. In terms of other criteria, like water quality, water temperature, water source, and source of fry, those were observed to be on a neutral to medium parameters that ranges from 2-3 times respectively. In addition, the changed in salinity level of the water in the pond was low for the past 5 years” (lines 185-190). “Exposure (E) analysis revealed that most of the market places in Davao region were low expose to weather disturbances and natural hazards that may occur and either the exposure of their household site and their community (Table 4). These values indicate that the market place/stall (E1) and household site (E2) and community site (E3), experienced rare (0-2 times) occurrence of weather disturbances in a year, such as typhoons, floods, tidal fluctuations” (lines 213-218) [Vendors] “observed no change of sales or the sold kilogram per day…In terms of the temperature, they haven’t noticed any change of weather in their market place” (lines 229; 232-233) “most of the vendors haven’t change any of their marketing techniques. It’s just the season and the pandemic that has change the things in the market” (lines 244-245). “Fortunately, most of the Penaeus vannamei farmers in Mati City observed that the shrimp volume production did not shrink, but also it did not grow. Accordingly, the shrimp farmers were still able to achieved their volume targets including the average weight of the shrimp after a period of culture (e.g 24 g – 30 g / 70-100 days of culture). Under the parameter of sensitivity in the FishVool tool, no growth corresponds to a medium score. Which was the case of the P. vannamei farmers of Mati. dium score. Which was the case of the the P. vannamei farmers of Mati. There were few farmers who answered that there was an increase in the volume of shrimp produced compared five years ago. But predominantly most of the respondents, gave an answer of no observed changes” (lines 281-289)	=Climate change is a very serious problem for shrimp farmers in parts of the Philippines, from the result of the study in Mati City and around the region, the results showed a moderate vulnerability response to climate change. This result is due to low exposure to weather disturbances and other hazards to the shrimp pond of the farmers in the community. In a span of one year, farmers tend to encounter and experience rare occurrences of typhoons, floods, storm surges, and other weather disturbances that might affect their shrimp aquaculture. Mati City is not prone to typhoon unlike other areas of the Philippines where shrimp farming is also present such as in Northern Mindanao which is also exposed to occurrences of typhoons, which can destroy their dikes. Mati is quite unique in that one side is facing the Pacific while the other side faces the Davao Gulf or near Celebes Sea. The east coast part, although it is also exposed to typhoons, have not experienced any supertyphoons or signal number three typhoons, except those found near Northern Mindanao or in CARAGA region.             =This refers to the direct impacts of climate change, that in the case of Mati City where the ponds are currently located, they are not directly exposed to frequent occurrences of typhoons.
(2) The authors say it is important to differentiate between the impacts of climate change and the impacts of other threats to shrimp production: “In order to effectively reduce the risk of current and future disasters, it is important to distinguish what aspects of a given disaster are due to climate change and what aspects are due to other factors leading to vulnerability; such as environment, economic, social or political factors. Incorrectly attributing the cause of a specific disaster, whether it is a direct cause or a fundamental cause, may ultimately increase the vulnerability of the population at risk by taking away focus from the issues that are truly causing he vulnerability” (lines 364-370) But they fail to provide evidence that the damage done to shrimp farms in the Philippines is due to climate change rather than other causes. For example, they assert on lines 61-63 that   “Changes in climate variables largely affect the shrimp production and market by increasing frequency of shrimp disease, causing physical damage to farm structure and deteriorating quality of water”. But where is their evidence for this assertion?   On lines 372-380, they mix up the effects of climate change with the effects of the Covid pandemic: “Shrimp farming is an essential source of food and livelihood for people living in Mati City. Their culturing of shrimp was medium vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. This indicates a low adaptive capacity of farmers towards the impacts of climate change to their shrimps. Aside from this, farmers were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic which limits them from getting more income. The same was true with the shrimp vendors who encountered difficulties selling their shrimp harvests for the reason of less buyers and less mobility due to the pandemic [56,57]. The shrimps from the farms were sold at lesser prices and this was not good for the farmers because their investments cannot be recouped when prices were down”. Moreover, the authors do not convincingly explain why it is important to differentiate between climate change impacts and impacts of other threats. On lines 63-67, the authors imply that adaptation techniques will fail if farmers do not understand which threats are from climate change:     “Shrimp farmers try to adapt to those changes in various ways, including increasing pond depth, exchanging tidal water, strengthening earthen dike and netting and fencing around the dike. However, there is a lack of understanding about the adaptation measures taken by the local shrimp farmers with respect to the emergence of specific impacts from changes of climatic variables” But if farmers are faced with threats to their shrimp production such as increasing disease or deteriorating water quality, what does it matter whether they attribute such threats to climate change? They have to deal with the threats as best they can whatever their cause.	=In general, the impacts of climate change to fishery sector were high. But as it appears to be the first assessment of vulnerability of shrimp to climate change, the risk of impacts is much associated with other threats. In shrimp farming water quality is the most crucial aspect that a farmer should investigate and protect. If other threats like pollution will facilitate to this aspect, the bigger opportunity of damage will happen to the shrimp farms. Like dying of shrimps and contamination of water due to pollutants. It is important to take actions and give attention to these impacts because in the same manner these threats serve as drivers of climate change.         =I think these are not assertions but have been documented in the past in our country and I have added a modification or a second following sentence “These damages to fisheries, aquaculture and farm infrastructures have been previously documented in past events and even based on fisher knowledge” [2,15,16]. With corresponding references as evidence in lines 104 to 106.     =In lines 372-380 or currently line 437 and 438, this was revised to reflect clearly what we are saying which was simply reiterating that besides the impact of climate change, the fish farmers were also affected by COVID-19, we just mentioned them as we understand that could be another study in itself.         =I think we have already revised this portion and explained that there is a difference in terms of impact of threats but it is possible that it can elevate or worsen its effects. For instance in shrimp aquaculture the impact of diseases and marine pollution could worsen under climate change as a water higher temperature can reduce the oxygen content of the pond…even this could make shrimps susceptible to diseases.          =I agree with the reviewer that farmers have to deal with the threats as best as they can, but when farmers are not knowledgeable, they will need to resort to tactics and strategies that are not really scientific and working. For instance, farmers, because of income motivations, do not really allow a follow period or period of rest for their aquaculture or culture practices which could result to higher disease susceptibility.
(3) In the Discussion section 4, the authors’ focus jumps around from one theme to another. It begins with an account of the direct and indirect effects of climate change (second paragraph). Then it notes that most shrimp farmers in Mali said there was no change in shrimp production (third paragraph). Then it refers to the importance of education in teaching farmers about the environment (fourth paragraph). Then it describes the lack of help given to shrimp farmers by the government (fifth paragraph). Then it talks about possible adaptation strategies (sixth paragraph). Then it discusses the economics of shrimp farming and the harm done to it by the Covid pandemic (seventh paragraph). Then it says how important it is to differentiate the threat of climate change from other threats (eighth paragraph. There is no common thread or consistent argument running through the Discussion section.	=The discussion section was revised and the description of the climate and weather in the region was removed in the discussion section and placed in the description of the study area; =To remove confusion, subheadings were added to provide topic based paragraph runs; =The common thread of discussion or theme revolves around climate change impacts and vulnerability and ends with what can be done or governmental policy that will help the fish farmers. This has been addressed in lines 335-354, 382-393, 434-437. The subheadings provided better subdivisions of the topics discussed and related from the results.
(4) In the Conclusion section 5, the authors assert that the government should give more support to shrimp farmers without explaining why, given that the impact of climate change on most shrimp farmers seems to be limited. They also assert that the government should take steps to improve the biosecurity of shrimp farms, but they do not explain what steps should be taken.  This paper lacks sufficient rigour of analysis to be published. The authors need to clarify precisely what the level of threat from climate change is to shrimp farmers in the Philippines and how it can be differentiated from other threats. Also their Discussion and Conclusion sections need to be re-written in a more coherent fashion	This current study is adapted from studies of Jacinto et al. 2014 and De Chavez et al. 2021. The methods used in this study were also adopted from those previous published papers. The conclusion and recommendation was shortened and tightened, also the conclusion arising from the study and its implications for more adaptations are but justified based on the results of the study and the recommendations were also well-justified.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The author did not reply to my queries specifically, and so I consider the manuscript has not improved, particularly regarding the state of the art. I still do not see clearly how the article improved in relation to my specific queries.  In this section, I wanted to see some disciplinary contributions. Please give it a try, specifically regarding the state of the art and the hypothesis.

Author Response

Reviewer report 1

The author did not reply to my queries specifically, and so I consider the manuscript has not improved, particularly regarding the state of the art. I still do not see clearly how the article improved in relation to my specific queries.  In this section, I wanted to see some disciplinary contributions. Please give it a try, specifically regarding the state of the art and the hypothesis.

Response to reviewer 1:

=Yes this was already addressed in the paper for additional changes and information, these were highlighted in yellow and see in Lines 40-55, Lines 65-70, Lines 81-90, the methods section was also improved, changes were in lines 127-134

Reviewer 2 Report

This manuscript has improved, the methodology and results are clear now.  I do not have more additional comments. 

Author Response

Reviewer report 2

This manuscript has improved, the methodology and results are clear now.  I do not have more additional comments. 

Response to reviewer 2: Thank you for accepting the revisions of the paper

Reviewer 3 Report

1. Table 4. Point out that the Vulnerability category score is low from 0 to 2, and the score is medium from 3 to 4. Since 2 to 3 is not continuous, is 2.1 to 2.9 means low or medium?
2. The AC2 value of Table 5. is 0.4. Could you explain the reason for this?
3. Due to the lack of research on the size of fish farms and the operating scale of fish farmers, there may be a significant gap in evaluating the adaptation strategy when there is a significant gap in the breeding scale.

Author Response

Reviewer report 3

1. Table 4. Point out that the Vulnerability category score is low from 0 to 2, and the score is medium from 3 to 4. Since 2 to 3 is not continuous, is 2.1 to 2.9 means low or medium?
2. The AC2 value of Table 5. is 0.4. Could you explain the reason for this?
3. Due to the lack of research on the size of fish farms and the operating scale of fish farmers, there may be a significant gap in evaluating the adaptation strategy when there is a significant gap in the breeding scale.

 

Response to reviewer 3:

 

Answer to point 1, is that 2.1 to 2.9 is considered to be under medium while a number beyond 4 is considered to be high

 

Answer to point 2, Thank you for calling our attention with regards to this number, we made a mistake with this and it was supposed to be 1.4 instead of 0.4 and this was already corrected in the paper.

 

Answer to point 3, Yes we can agree with the reviewer with regards to this significant gap, even though there are many pilot studies being done, commercial operators are using large scale operation and some of these adaptations being made with regards to climate change impacts or vulnerabilities should be implemented before the construction of ponds or the siting of the ponds or aquaculture area. Since fuel or electricity cost among small holder farms and commercial farms are number two and number one cost of operation, design of the ponds and the way the aquaculture operates should already include adaptation or ways to adapt to possible climate change impacts. Currently farms in the Davao region use paddlewheels for aeration and the commercial farms have complete accessories for culturing shrimps including migrating their electricity source to solar power. Most of the postlarvae used for shrimp cultivation by the farmers are sourced outside Mati and the Davao region.

Reviewer 4 Report

I am not yet happy with this revised paper.  

(1) The first issue I raised was whether climate change is a serious problem for shrimp farmers in the Philippines or only a minor problem. In their response, the authors say it is a very serious problem in parts of the Philippines, but that in Mati City it is not a serious problem. Can they explain why climate change affects different parts of the Philippines in different ways?

(2) The second issue I raised was that the authors failed to show that damage suffered by shrimp farms in |the Philippines was caused by climate change rather than by other causes. The authors’ response is very odd – that because their paper is the first to examine the impact of climate change on shrimp farms in the Philippines, “the risk of impacts is much associated with other threats”. I do not understand this argument. Another argument appears to be that previous writers have asserted that damage suffered by the shrimp farmers is due to climate change. But why should we accept the assertions made by other writers? What evidence did those writers produce to substantiate their assertions?

(3) The third issue I raised was that there was no common thread running through the Discussion section. The authors have reorganised the Discussion section and made it coherent. Fine.

(4) The fourth issue I raised was about the Conclusion section, where the authors failed to explain (a) why government support should be given to shrimp farmers to help them deal with the impacts of climate change when those impacts seemed to be minor for most farmers; and (b) what steps the government should take to improve the biosecurity of shrimp farms. The authors have not responded explicitly to either of these points.

Until and unless the authors deal satisfactorily with (1), (2) and (4) I am unable to recommend publication of their paper     

Author Response

I am not yet happy with this revised paper.  

(1) The first issue I raised was whether climate change is a serious problem for shrimp farmers in the Philippines or only a minor problem. In their response, the authors say it is a very serious problem in parts of the Philippines, but that in Mati City it is not a serious problem. Can they explain why climate change affects different parts of the Philippines in different ways?

Answers:

=I do not think that we mentioned that in Mati this is a minor problem, in fact, to the contrary, we mentioned in our paper that our fish farmers perceived that they are affected by climate change and based on the results of the FishVool Assessment, they are considered to be medium vulnerable and are affected by climate change see Lines 268 to lines 270 because of their sensitivity and exposure factors in which they are both medium and low… medium means that the fish farmers and their shrimp farms are actually medium vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. With regards to the impact in the whole Philippines, we can only extrapolate based on other studies related to aquaculture which also says that they are highly affected and vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, in particular due to environmental degradation, increase in sea surface temperature, dike erosions, river siltations, mangrove degradation etc[1-3].

 

(2) The second issue I raised was that the authors failed to show that damage suffered by shrimp farms in |the Philippines was caused by climate change rather than by other causes. The authors’ response is very odd – that because their paper is the first to examine the impact of climate change on shrimp farms in the Philippines, “the risk of impacts is much associated with other threats”. I do not understand this argument. Another argument appears to be that previous writers have asserted that damage suffered by the shrimp farmers is due to climate change. But why should we accept the assertions made by other writers? What evidence did those writers produce to substantiate their assertions?

 

Answers:

=Answers to the question of the reviewer is in fact true because some of our interviewed milkfish operators in our previous paper were also farming shrimps or combining their farming operation with other types of cultured species. There are ponds that are highly exposed to typhoons causing pond dikes to collapse as well as inundate other waterways when this happens, including changes in water temperature and flooding due to sea level rise or intrusions. All of these reasons can lead to diseases or vulnerability of the shrimps being cultured and any untreated water that goes to the ponds due to flooding or overflow from the sea can possibly carry disease or expose the cultured shrimp to stress and disease. As our assessment was local or mostly in Mati, most of the emanating impacts or sensitivity is in connection to low oxygen due to high stocking density, high feeding frequency and pollution. Another is exposure to higher temperature which is the general case in the Philippines as mentioned in the study of Geronimo 2018 and presence of waves because of increasing sea level rise [4,5]. Though shrimp farms in Mati may not have been directly hit by typhoons or high waves, other areas in the Philippines such as in Bulacan, Negros and Surigao were all affected by typhoons which in turn affected their profit.

(3) The third issue I raised was that there was no common thread running through the Discussion section. The authors have reorganised the Discussion section and made it coherent. Fine.

(4) The fourth issue I raised was about the Conclusion section, where the authors failed to explain (a) why government support should be given to shrimp farmers to help them deal with the impacts of climate change when those impacts seemed to be minor for most farmers; and (b) what steps the government should take to improve the biosecurity of shrimp farms. The authors have not responded explicitly to either of these points.

Answer:

=I think we did not say that the impact is minor on most farmers, the Philippines remains to be highly impacted by climate change both in capture fisheries and on land due to typhoons or extreme events that impact the country every year. The impacts of extreme events alone generate variable but total humanitarian crises that is related to food insecurity etc. putting the Philippines sometimes to appear in top highly vulnerable nations [6]. When you experience a kind of medium vulnerability see Lines 249 up to lines 267, this is not minor but the fishers or fish farmers are instead trying to withstand the impact of the exposure although their adaptation capacity is low and may need to be increased as they currently experience a low adaptive capacity and medium sensitivity. They are also highly dependent to shrimp farming alone, making them vulnerable for any un-anticipated impacts of climate change or disasters. In this regard, the government should provide help in increasing or capacitating the local shrimp farmers whether this has something to do with knowledge or actual changes in design of the pond dikes e.g. pond dike upgrading, water quality and water temperature monitoring, and other possible adaptation. This was mentioned in Macusi et al., 2021 with regards to vulnerability drivers in the milkfish aquaculture sector and this is not different from the shrimp aquaculture sector as many milkfish ponds are located in brackishwater ponds which includes shrimp farms. Moreover, in the paper of Jacinto et al., 2015, tuna fishers and sardine fishing communities in General Santos City and Zamboanga City also had medium vulnerability and fishers were advised that they should increase their adaptive capacities so that they can lower their overall vulnerabilities to climate change impacts. They have been advised to increase their education or training and awareness regarding climate change impacts and adaptation.

=With regards to biosecurity of the smallholder farms, this is much more focused on establishing local ordinances to put up footbaths, tyrebaths in the location of the smallholder farms, including additional requirements of rubber or plastic lining of ponds, and dike upgrading. In the case of Mati, the local government sector was powerful enough to implement stopping of farm operations especially when these are affected by diseases. It is  therefore powerful enough also to order that these local farms should observe quarantine measures for larvae sourced from various places as well as conduct necessary changes in their chemical inputs or water treatment methods and pond upgrading. After all the taxes of these farms are also collected by the local government.

1. Macusi, E.D.; Kezia L. Camaso, K.L.; Barboza, A.; Macusi, E.R. Perceived vulnerability and climate change impacts on small-scale fisheries in Davao gulf, Philippines. Frontiers in Marine Science 2021, 8, 597385, doi:doi: 10.3389/fmars.2021.597385.
2. Macusi, E.D.; Geronimo, R.C.; Santos, M.D. Vulnerability drivers for small pelagics and milkfish aquaculture value chain determined through online participatory approach. Marine Policy 2021, 133, 104710, doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2021.104710.
3. Liu, J.-M.; Borazon, E.Q.; Muñoz, K.E. Critical problems associated with climate change: a systematic review and meta-analysis of Philippine fisheries research. Environmental Science and Pollution Research 2021, doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-15712-6.

4. Geronimo, R.C. Projected climate change impacts on Philippine marine fish distributions; Department of Agriculture-Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources: Quezon City, 2018.
5. Anticamara, J.A.A.; Go, K.T.B. Impacts of super-typhoon Yolanda on Philippine reefs and communities. Reg Environ Change 2017, 17, 703-713.
6. Monnier, L.; Gascuel, D.; Alava, J.J.; Barragán, M.J.; Gaibor, N.; Hollander, F.A.; Kanstinger, P.; Niedermueller, S.; Ramírez, J.; Cheung, W.W.L. Small-scale fisheries in a warming ocean: exploring adaptation to climate change; WWF Germany, 2020.