Changes and Factors Determining the Efficiency of Cattle Farming in the State of Pará, Brazilian Amazon

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In the Abstract, apart from providing a lot of information forming the background of the considerations and elements of the research method, it was also worth clearly formulating the purpose of the research / research study.

At the end of the Introduction, the authors formulated the objectives of the research study in the form of two questions. I think that these two questions would be better used in the context of formulating the research problem resulting from the review of the literature / state of knowledge in the considered field. The research problem can be linked to the presentation of a gap in the current state of knowledge, which is then translated into the formulation of the study objective. I suggest that, regardless of the main purpose of the research/study, you should also write what was the cognitive (scientific) and what was the utilitarian (useful) purpose of the study. Thanks to this, in the Conclusions it will be easier to refer to these goals and determine whether they have been achieved and what are the prospects for further research to be carried out in a given thematic scope.

At the end of the title of an article (as well as a book, monograph, etc.) it is unlikely to put a dot, so it is worth correcting it in the reviewed article.

I would like to ask about the links between the content of the article and the concept of sustainability. I think that in the article and its content it would be worth developing this topic in more detail. If the article has been submitted to a Sustainability journal, then in my opinion it is necessary to justify what issues related to sustainability were developed in the article and explored in practice.

The formulas on pages 3 and 4 should be marked with (1) and (2), which will make it easier to refer to these model formulas later in the article. The same remark applies to the other formulas given in the article, on pages 6, 7 and 8.

In the case of some formulas, for example in line 219, it would be worth specifying the units in which individual values are expressed. Does the concept of "value" in the case of the above-mentioned formula (in line: 219) refer to economic categories (expressed in the currency of the country) or does it rather refer to the amount of the considered factor? It would be worth in this part of the article to specify how (in what units) the term "value" is understood. Thanks to this (by the way) it would be possible to identify in what units the LQ (Location Quotient) is expressed. If this quantity (LQ) is not expressed in any units, it is also worth writing about it.

I would like to ask about the "People employed" factor included in Table 2. Did this notion generally include employed persons, or were they persons who met the criterion of full annual working time (approx. 2,200 hours of work per year). It would be worth including such detailed information in the Materials and Methods chapter.

In my opinion, the Materials and Methods chapter should be supplemented with a subchapter entitled Statistical Analysis. In the Results chapter, the authors present many indicators and information resulting from the conducted statistical analysis, e.g. the results of the Shapiro-Wilk test. Therefore, the article needs a subchapter Statistical analysis, which will present the most important assumptions of the planned statistical considerations in the study / research study.

In Table 2 and elsewhere, the acronym CV is used without explaining what it means. Theoretically, it can be assumed that every reader knows what a CV means. Regardless, however, I think it would be worth giving an explanation and interpretation of the CV acronym.

In my opinion, one of the key factors identifying changes affecting the efficiency of cattle breeding/production is progress. In practice, in relation to cattle breeding, breeding/biological progress, technical and technological progress can be indicated. Therefore, in the article, it is worth developing the thread of progress in relation to cattle breeding / production, citing, for example, the publication: "Implementation of technical and technological progress in dairy production". This material includes the concept of the technological level, which the authors mention in their article, in line 169. Writing in this paragraph (lines: 163-171) about the low technological level, it would be worth explaining to the readers how the "low" technological level is interpreted. The aforementioned article (Implementation ...) defines the concept of the technological level and its scope, so readers can refer to this material to explain what "low" technological level means.

I would like to find out (it is worth writing about it in the article) what practical conclusions and recommendations result from the conducted research study. In the Conclusions, the authors wrote about important implications for sustainable development (line: 430), but such a generally formulated thread would be worth expanding with more practical aspects. The authors wrote that "Governments and companies can use these results to identify areas that need intervention ..." (lines: 439-440), but this sentence should be supplemented with the information that it is a practical effect of the research study.

Author Response

Por favor, verifique o anexo.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper is well written and good to read. I assume that the methodology of the investigation is correct; I am not an expert here. However, I doubt the merit of the investigation for the following reasons: the authors write that the efficiency of cattle farming in the state of Pará increased by only 1 % within 11 years - so the question arises why the reasons for this poor performance have to be evaluated and studied in detail. Please check this poor rate in efficiency increase. I faintly remember having revised a very similar study not a long time ago. Therefrom and from the list of references, the specific novelty of this investigation is unclear. Half of the references are in Brazilian which makes a judgement of the originality of the manuscript additionally difficult.

The English language is fine. I advise to authors to critically re-read the manuscript; possibly a few spelling errors or typos can be found. I am not a native English speaker.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The essay deals with an interesting question. However, several points urgently need to be improved:

1) Despite all explanations, it is not completely clear what is meant by efficiency (especially since there are very different concepts of efficiency; see, for example, Ekardt, Sustainability: Transformation, Governance, Ethics, Law, Springer 2020). Are only material goods included in the consideration? Are only goods that have a market price included? In what form are ecological aspects taken into account? How do the authors arrive at their - at least dubious - assumption that it is ecologically better per se to use a smaller area intensively instead of a large area extensively?

2) Furthermore, there is no discussion on the ecological relevance of animal husbandry and on the necessity and extent of the necessary reduction (see Weishaupt et al., Sustainability 2020, 2053).

3) What are the authors' views on the current discussion on new policy instruments for livestock farming? (see also Weishaupt et al., Sustainability 2020, 2053)

none

Author Response

Por favor, veja o anexo.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I accept the arguments of the authors that the efficiency of cattle farming is most relevant in the microregions of the state; the manuscript was improved because the authors described this fact now more explicitely. There are only a few minor issues to be corrected before the paper can be published.

Detailed comments:

Line 22: delete "to"

Line 269: QL should probably changed to LQ

Line 299: Wald statistics

Lines 381-385: since one farmer is mentioned, all verbs in this paragraph need an "s": meets, owns, uses, generates, has

Line 407: remove blanks

 

English is fine, only minor editing needed.

Author Response

We appreciate the feedback and have made all the suggested corrections.

Reviewer 3 Report

none

Author Response

We appreciate the feedback.