Decision Support System for the Assessment and Enhancement of Agrobiodiversity Performance

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Please check the attached document

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Moderate editing required

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1,

We would like to thank you for carefully examining our work and for allowing us to revise and improve the manuscript. We have addressed all your comments and suggestions and modified the paper accordingly. All modifications are marked in blue color in the revised manuscript to facilitate the review process. Please see below our detailed responses to every single comment raised. We are now confident that the paper is ready to be published.

Yours sincerely,

The Authors

Reviewer 1/ Comment 1:

 General comments

The authors have attempted to explore and elucidate on the development of accurate and adequate agrobidiversity assessment methods that can support sustainable agricultural management. They present a decision support system that incoporates farmscale quantitative assessment agrobiodiversity parameters to promote agricultural benefits. The focus of the study is topical, relevant and timely. The methodology applied is appropriate to objectively achieve their goal. The flow of the manuscript is adequate with a good readability and composition. However, the discussion can be improved by relating the findings with other works.

Specific comments

Abstract

The abstract is fine.

Keywords

They are appropriate

Title

The title is appropriate for the study subject.

 Answer 1: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  Your insights were fundamental to improving the content of the paper.

Reviewer 1/ Comment 2:

 Introduction

• The introduction appropriately sets out the need for the study.
• The introduction is well written and appropriately referenced.
• The objectives of the study are clear.
• The authors have given a good description of agrobiodiversity. However, I am wondering if the authors can bring table two into this section since it provides a good synopsis of literature on recommendations of sources and corresponding benefits associated with agrobiodiversity indicators.
• Because the discussed measures are meant to be applied in the farms, it would be beneficial if the authors can add the statement “by farmers who are the sole decision makers and managers in farming operations (Manono, 2016)” between the words “changed” and “to improve” in line 69. This assertion is clearly supported by the authors’ concluding remarks in line 362-363.

Answer 2: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. Despite Table 2 providing a useful synopsis of the literature, the authors agreed to keep Table 2 in the section Materials and Methods since the main aim of the Table is to present the basis for the information presented in the Decision Support System regarding recommendations and corresponding expected benefits. The proposed statement and supporting reference were added.

Reviewer 1/ Comment 3:

Materials and methods

The materials and methods section are well described. It is worthy to note the following:

• The methods described are scientifically sound and replicable.
• Indicators selected on based on ease to obtain, scientific literature, government regulations and reputable organisations. Table one actually provides the procedures used to select these indicators.
• The authors have devised and clearly described a novel methodology tailored to suit specific indicators that are affected by environmental factors e.g. species richness to ensure that monitored parameters align with desired results.
• Clear steps for data collection procedures are provided.
• However, it is not clear how the collected data was analysed.

Answer 3: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. Information about data collection and analysis was added.

Reviewer 1/ Comment 4: Results

The results are well presented. However:

• Authors should rewrite the captions of table 3, and figures 1-3 to make them self explanatory.
• Authors can also increase the font of the writings of the figures 1-3 by presenting them in landscape orientation layout to make them clear.

Answer 4: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. The titles of captions were rewritten and Tables 3, 4 and 5 and Figure 1 were replaced in order to hide the columns with excluded analysis and provide a better visualisation of the content in Tables/Figures.

Reviewer 1/ Comment 5: The discussion can be improved by:

• Providing the result implications on the sustainability of the farming system.
• Discussing the data collected in relation to other studies. This is where the data discussed in the introduction can come in. It will help link data with agricultural sustainability and farming efficiency to fit into the study objective and compare with those discussed in Table 2.

 Answer 5: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. The authors added an explanation in the results section, reporting that the increase in biodiversity indicator was due to the increase in average species richness of cover crops per sample. Therefore, in the discussion section, the results obtained were compared to the conclusion of the study by Raffa et al. [45], outlining the differences in the conclusions that can be drawn from this study. Since it was only possible to collect data for 2 years, conclusions about the implications for the sustainability of the farming system are limited, which was highlighted in lines 354-360. However, the test of the developed DSS demonstrated the capacity of this tool regarding the aspects mentioned in lines 335-343.

Reviewer 1/ Comment 6:

Conclusions

The conclusion is supported by data.

References

The references are appropriate and sufficient. However, I have suggested one reference which reports on an important factor – “the issue of decision making through farmer empowerment”.

1. Manono, B. O. (2016). New Zealand dairy farm effluent, irrigation and soil biota management for sustainability: Farmer priorities and monitoring. Cogent Food & Agriculture, 2(1), 1221636.

Answer 6: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. The mentioned reference was added, and all the references were rewritten accordingly.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper brings an interesting contribution to the practice of agrobiodiversity performance assessment.

As the authors state, although the paper does not bring “an innovative contribution” or a methodological breakthrough, I think it introduces a guide to those interesting in translating models and literature issues into hands on frameworks.

I suggest making the DSS available for those interesting in testing and improving it.

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2,

We would like to thank you for carefully examining our work and for allowing us to revise and improve the manuscript. Please see below our response to your comment. We are now confident that the paper is ready to be published.

Yours sincerely,

The Authors

Reviewer 2/ Comment 1: The paper brings an interesting contribution to the practice of agrobiodiversity performance assessment.

As the authors state, although the paper does not bring “an innovative contribution” or a methodological breakthrough, I think it introduces a guide to those interesting in translating models and literature issues into hands on frameworks.

I suggest making the DSS available for those interested in testing and improving it.

Answer 1: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  From a future research perspective, it is intended to convert the developed DSS into an app with new functionalities as now stated in lines 393 and 394 and make it available to those who might be interested in testing and improving it.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This study presents a decision support system to promote agrobiodiversity which incorporates not only a quantitative assessment of relevant indicators of agrobiodiversity performance but also provides enhancement practices recommendations and associated benefits, presenting an action plan in order of priority. The paper is complete and well formatted, but the following problems exist:

(1) The empirical analysis is too simplistic. The conclusions on the increase in biodiversity, harvest yield and enemy-to-pest ratio drawn from the comparative analysis of two years of data using Microsoft Excel are not entirely reliable and require further investigation.

(2) The benchmark method used in this paper to summarize indicator scores in  assessing biodiversity. The authors also outline the advantages of the benchmark method over other methods, but principal component analysis (PCA), factor analysis, entropy value method, etc. are probably the most common methods we use to construct composite indices. Compared to these methods, the advantages of the benchmark method do not stand out.

(3) There is redundancy in the structure of the study. Table 2 focus on the recommendations and corresponding benefits associated with biodiversity indicators, but this is not closely linked to the main study of the paper.

(4) In the research conclusion section. The authors simply list the results of the study (Fig 1, Fig 2, and Fig 3) but do not conduct a detailed analysis of the contents of the tables.

(5) In terms of access to data, this paper is extended to 5 years when only 2 years of data are available. If the data are not available, does the 5-year extension make sense?

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3,

We would like to thank you for carefully examining our work and for allowing us to revise and improve the manuscript. We have addressed all your comments and suggestions and modified the paper accordingly. All modifications are marked in blue color in the revised manuscript to facilitate the review process. Please see below our detailed responses to every single comment raised. We are now confident that the paper is ready to be published.

Yours sincerely,

The Authors

Reviewer 3/ Comment 1: This study presents a decision support system to promote agrobiodiversity which incorporates not only a quantitative assessment of relevant indicators of agrobiodiversity performance but also provides enhancement practices recommendations and associated benefits, presenting an action plan in order of priority. The paper is complete and well formatted, but the following problems exist:

(1) The empirical analysis is too simplistic. The conclusions on the increase in biodiversity, harvest yield and enemy-to-pest ratio drawn from the comparative analysis of two years of data using Microsoft Excel are not entirely reliable and require further investigation.

Answer 1: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  Your insights were fundamental to improving the content of the paper. More explanation was added in lines 354-360 about the limitations of the analysis from an inference perspective. Despite the simplicity of the empirical analysis, the test of the developed DSS demonstrated the capacity of this tool regarding the aspects mentioned in lines 335-343.

Reviewer 3/ Comment 2: (2) The benchmark method used in this paper to summarize indicator scores in  assessing biodiversity. The authors also outline the advantages of the benchmark method over other methods, but principal component analysis (PCA), factor analysis, entropy value method, etc. are probably the most common methods we use to construct composite indices. Compared to these methods, the advantages of the benchmark method do not stand out.

Answer 2: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. In lines 127-129, a sentence was added mentioning the most common methods regarding the normalisation of indicators in biodiversity assessment. According to reference 32 (citation below*), the benchmark method offers an additional advantage over other methods, as now presented in lines 133-134.

*“Although the study of Roul et al. [37] considered equal weights, it also applied expert weights and principal component analysis (PCA) and factor analysis methodologies to assign weights when the indicators were correlated. It was concluded that PCA is not appropriate when the correlation among the indicators is low. This method is also characterized by difficulty in results’ interpretation, as it is hard for the users to understand how the selection of indicators, weighting criteria, and principal components influence the index’s final value [37].”

Reviewer 3/ Comment 3: (3) There is redundancy in the structure of the study. Table 2 focus on the recommendations and corresponding benefits associated with biodiversity indicators, but this is not closely linked to the main study of the paper.

Answer 3: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  Table 2 was included to present the basis for the information displayed in the Decision Support System regarding recommendations and corresponding expected benefits (Figure 2. “Sustainable Practices” section of the DSS). The authors considered that if the information were not presented with the corresponding references, the information displayed in the “Sustainable Practices” section of the DSS would lack bibliographic support and it could compromise the replicability of the Decision Support System as the entire list of recommendations associated with each indicator would not be presented.

Reviewer 3/ Comment 4: (4) In the research conclusion section. The authors simply list the results of the study (Fig 1, Fig 2, and Fig 3) but do not conduct a detailed analysis of the contents of the tables.

Answer 4: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  More explanation of the contents of tables was added, namely in lines 252-255, 266-271, and 320-324.

Reviewer 3/ Comment 5: (5) In terms of access to data, this paper is extended to 5 years when only 2 years of data are available. If the data are not available, does the 5-year extension make sense?

Answer 5: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment.  Since only two years were studied, the columns with excluded analysis were hidden in the Microsoft Excel document, and all the tables and figures were replaced to exhibit only the values of 2022 and 2023.

 

 

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Author.

This was mentioned before. The article uses only two years of data, so why did it conclude that DSS can analyse biodiversity performance over 5 years? Why not 3 or 10 years? Need more explanation.

Sincerely.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 3,

We would like to thank you for carefully examining our work and for allowing us to revise and improve the manuscript. We have addressed all your comments and suggestions and modified the paper accordingly. All modifications are marked in blue color in the revised manuscript to facilitate the review process. Please see below our detailed responses to every single comment raised. We are now confident that the paper is ready to be published.

Yours sincerely,

The Authors

Reviewer 3/ Comment 1: Dear Author.

This was mentioned before. The article uses only two years of data, so why did it conclude that DSS can analyse biodiversity performance over 5 years? Why not 3 or 10 years? Need more explanation.

Sincerely.

Answer 1: The authors of the paper thank you for this comment. Your insights were fundamental to improving the content of the paper. “The DSS was initially tested with data from two years to validate its functionality and effectiveness. Despite this, the system is designed to accommodate and analyze data over extended periods, providing a more comprehensive view of agrobiodiversity performance. This flexibility ensures that users can tailor the DSS application to the length of their available datasets and specific analytical needs. Consequently, while the present study demonstrates the DSS using two years of data, its design inherently supports longer-term analyses, enhancing its utility for sustainable agricultural management. Since the DSS was developed using Microsoft® Excel, the user can obtain biodiversity performance assessment and decision support for the desired number of years by simply adding new columns and dragging the fill handle to copy formulas. Table 3 exhibits the answers obtained with collected data on the viticultural farm for the two studied years.” This section was included in Results chapter

“The Decision Support System (DSS) was tested using two years of data collected in the field to demonstrate its functionality and potential for assessing agrobiodiversity performance. However, the DSS can analyze biodiversity performance over longer periods. A longer time frame enables a more robust and comprehensive evaluation of trends and variations in agrobiodiversity. While shorter periods can also be used to capture initial trends, longer periods will provide a more balanced approach to observing significant changes and patterns, which may be necessary for more accurate and meaningful assessments. Conversely, extending the analysis to a longer period, while potentially yielding even deeper insights, may also introduce additional complexities and data collection challenges. The flexibility of the DSS design allows it to adapt to various time spans according to the data availability and specific requirements of the users. Therefore, while this study utilized two years of data for initial testing, the system's capabilities extend to multi-year analyses, supporting more refined decision-making in agricultural management.” This text section was include in Discussion chapter.

We are now confident that the manuscript is ready to be published.