Blockchain Technology to Enhance Integrated Blue Economy: A Case Study in Strengthening Sustainable Tourism on Smart Islands

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper entitled” Blockchain technology to enhance integrated blue economy:  Case study in strengthening sustainable tourism on Smart islands” deals with a very interesting topic, and it included interesting ideas. In general, I appreciate the aims of this work; it is quite interesting and informative to most readers of this field.

However, I have the following comments that hopefully help the authors improve their paper:

·       The structure (outline) of the paper could be given at the end of the introductory chapter.

·       Literature Review section is missing. The introduction section is mixed with a literature review. I suggest to the authors a section dedicated to literature review where should analyse the existing works in the way to show the gap in the literature compared to this work.  To be valid, this paper must include a proper analysis of the relevant literature and then make a comparison with the authors' approach. For instance, the authors should organize all the reviewed papers in a table and compare the difference between these papers and this study.

·       I suggest that the authors add a research method diagram. This will provide a snapshot of the research steps followed and will help the reader in a clearer understanding of the paper.

·       The quality of the figures should be improved, in particular Figure 4.

·       What are the limitations of the study in terms of the proposed method, data used, approaches, and/or analysis?

·       How can you apply in practice and real life the smart island model? Is it feasible?  

·       The authors should convince the readers, that their contribution is so important. These issues deserve a deeper discussion: What are the implications for theory and practice? What are the managerial implications from this research? How does this understanding help organizations to make better decisions? How decision or policy makers could benefit from this study.

·       As usual a final thorough proof-reading is recommended.

 I encourage the author to think along those questions and to develop this work further along those lines.

Author Response

Revision of the manuscript has been written in accordance with the suggestions for improvement given.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This is an interesting paper. I believe that the authors are discussing an important topic.

Below, I offer my comments based on the structure of this article, hoping to help the authors polish the paper in better status.

The method is not adequately described, and the biggest problem is the lack of data, even if this is a mixed methods study, which is appreciated.

Very limited findings and discussion relating to the literature.

Pag. 15, line 528 "In addition, the results of this study also conclude...". The authors conclude not the results.

Finally, I think that the conclusions section needs improvement, namely by stressing the relevance and contribution of the manuscript, as in its current form, it is a repetition of the findings reported in previous sections. My major concern centers on the lack of theoretical depth and contribution of the paper. 

 

 

Author Response

Revision of the manuscript has been written in accordance with the suggestions for improvement given.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

In the attachment, you can find your manuscript with comments. I hope that these comments will help to improve your study.

The study is well established, but there is a lack of organization as well as poor writing. Namely, the English language should be improved.

The abstract needs clarification in terms what is the novelty and uniqueness of this study. Other readers as well as reviewer as me, cannot see the clear vision of the article that you intend to achieve and provide to the world (readership). Please, clarify in a sentence or two this vision at the beginning of your Abstract as well as try to emphasize it in more details in the Introduction part.

The Introduction part is very long and extensive. The citation of the literature is not given in a chronological way; the citations are not written in a proper way. There is a lot of repetition of the same sentences in different paragraphs. I pointed that in the suggestions of the attached commented version of the manuscript.

Therefore, the whole section Introduction should be reconsidered and written in a shorter and more concise way, more understandable for readers. There are few subsection (4) in the Introduction part, that is not an issue. However, at the final part of this section you should clearly state what are you going to achieve through your research or your “story”. Please summarise that what are you going to work for this purpose. It should be somewhere after Table 4, before section of Materials and methods.

Moreover, the section provides many individual sentences that are not well connected within the same paragraph and evermore no connections from one to another paragraph. I understood this section as a union of many other’s people statements without your own opinion. You have to make summary of other’s people work and state yor own hypothesis, that for example will look like: Based on research of A et al, and B et al, we are providing the concept of integrating them into One or personalized XYZ approach that will deliver or enhance????(this is just an example…it does not reefer actual situation of the study).

About tables used in the manuscript in the Introduction part: could you please merge them into one, because the columns (Dimension, Indicators) are the same, just you can use subtitles into one Table to designate their belonging, like smart destination, etc. And, if you use the same dimensions and indicators in your work for your hypothesis, you can place this table in the second part (Experimental) because it belongs there.

Please revise the manuscript.... I hope that the suggestions given in the attached document will positively contribute to the improvement the start of your manuscript.

Thank you.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Revision of the manuscript has been written in accordance with the suggestions for improvement given.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The article is entitled 'Blockchain Technology to Enhance Integrated Blue Economy: case study in Strengthening Sustainable Tourism on Smart Islands'. The purpose of the article is to build a model of an intelligent destination by using blockchain technology in the blue economy. The authors collected qualitative data covering publications in scientific journals and supplemented with the analysis of VOS browser and quantitative data from the completion of questionnaires. The research area covers the island of Seribu. The article may be interesting, but in my opinion it requires significant improvement:

- the title of the article is inadequate to the content,

- in my opinion, some of the information is repeated, especially describing blockchain technology. There is a lack of quantitative data results from questionnaires, and only on their basis can the travel model be determined.

- There is a lack of information on the research area that has been traced by modeling structural equations. The model itself was created based on 150 entities questionnaires. The authors do not carefully characterize the group of surveyed entities, the scope of questions and the methodology of questionnaire analysis used. This part of the study and development of results requires a detailed analysis.

- The results lack information on how attractive the object itself is in terms of tourism. Therefore, it seems that the presented conclusions have no coverage.

- The article should be directed to a wide audience, while the authors do not encourage readers' interest in this region of the world by the lack of a description of the research area.

In my opinion, the article requires major change.

 

Author Response

Revision of the manuscript has been written in accordance with the suggestions for improvement given.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 5 Report

It is an interesting paper with an analysis of literature to understand new research topics for sustainable tourism issues in smart islands. It emphasizes on blockchain technologies and it may be used in real world applications in the future. There are some format and style errors and missing information about some of the contents. I think making a proper decision could be possible after these revisions:

- There are some problems with in-text citations. You should use brackets "[x]" instead of parantheses "(x)".

- Introduction part is too long in my point of view. You should share a brief explanation of the subject of study, research questions, motivation and methods in 1 or 2 pages and the remaining detailed information about the subject must be given in successive parts. 7 or 8 pages length is too long for me.

- The explanation of material and methods part is too short. It is not clear to understand what materials and methods are used in the study.

- What is VOSviewer? You should give a short explanation about it.

- Structural equation modelling must be explained in Materials and Methods section.

- There is problem with references 50 and 58. Are they the same publication? If so, remove one of them from the reference list.

Author Response

Revision of the manuscript has been written in accordance with the suggestions for improvement given.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper has improved from the first round of reviews. However, the main weaknesses identified have not been addressed at all.

I hope the authors see that I am not being capricious, but it is my role to ensure that the science, we publish is robust and more references will add quality to your work.  

Author Response

The authors have revised the paper according to suggestions for improvement. Analysis and interpretation development is quite broadly developed in order to strengthen the novelty obtained.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors

I appreciate what you have done, but I feel that despite the many changes, the manuscript did not reach the scientific rigour to be published. If fact, you do not understand that VOSviewer analysis is quantitative and not a qualitative approach. Furthermore, the extensive list of items proposed does not provide de information needed to asses its suitability and relevance. 

Therefore I have to suggest rejection. 

Author Response

The authors have revised the paper according to suggestions for improvement. Analysis and interpretation development is quite broadly developed in order to strengthen the novelty obtained.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

I appreciate the efforts of the authors, but the article has been slightly improved. I still believe that the presented conclusions are not covered. Considerations on Blockchain technology to strengthen an integrated blue economy have not been clarified and supported by evidence. The research presents too much generality.

Author Response

The authors have revised the paper according to suggestions for improvement. Analysis and interpretation development is quite broadly developed in order to strengthen the novelty obtained.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 5 Report

The flowchart provided in Page 10 of the revised manuscript should have been prepared according to the flowchart design tools. A flowchart contains some nodes representing the start and end of the procedure, processes performed and/or decisions made during the procedure.

Please revise it properly before publication.

Author Response

The authors have revised the paper according to suggestions for improvement. Analysis and interpretation development is quite broadly developed in order to strengthen the novelty obtained.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 3

Reviewer 1 Report

The approach followed looks useful and the results are promising. Thus, in my opinion the paper is recommendable for publication.

Author Response

Thank you for providing suggestions for improvement for the perfection of the article which is expected to be useful for tourism development.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

good job

Author Response

Thank you for providing suggestions for improvement for the perfection of the article which is expected to be useful for tourism development.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The authors made a significant improvement to the article. My comments are as follows:

- The description of the research area (lines 131-150) should be inserted as subsection 3.1. In this section, it is a good idea to add a map with the location of the islands so that readers can locate their location.

 - Authors repeatedly quote the same literature items. Sometimes the wording is very general and a citation is inserted. This is unacceptable, eg position 4 is given in lines 128 and 130, position 5 is quoted in lines 223 and 224. There are too many multiple citations in the article, especially since they do not add much to the article.

- The list of references should be adapted to the requirements of the journal

Author Response

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors made a significant improvement to the article. My comments are as follows:

- The description of the research area (lines 131-150) should be inserted as subsection 3.1. In this section, it is a good idea to add a map with the location of the islands so that readers can locate their location.

The research area has been completed in accordance with the suggestions for improvement added on line 364-386.

 - Authors repeatedly quote the same literature items. Sometimes the wording is very general and a citation is inserted. This is unacceptable, eg position 4 is given in lines 128 and 130, position 5 is quoted in lines 223 and 224. There are too many multiple citations in the article, especially since they do not add much to the article.

Repetition of quotes has been changed using new references according to the topics discussed shown in line 149; 191; 194; 206; 207; 219; 224; 307; 612.

- The list of references should be adapted to the requirements of the journal

The following is list of references that have been adjusted according to the needs of journal presented at line 715-933.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 5 Report

Current form of the manuscript seems adequate for publication. Congratulations to your efforts.

Author Response

Thank you for providing suggestions for improvement for the perfection of the article which is expected to be useful for tourism development.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf