Rooted in Nature: The Rise, Challenges, and Potential of Organic Farming and Fertilizers in Agroecosystems

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)

This is an interesting manuscript. Please see the following comments

1) The summary  even though informative of the specific topics that you will deal with ultimately gives no deductions on these eg what about fertilization in OF? what you deduced? what about pest control? some specific solutions that you proposed based on the review? what about the challenges of OF? more specific-what are the most difficult and what the least difficult. This does not mean that the summary should be larger-it just means that you should replace the most vague sentences with specific solutions

2) OMRI give in full

3) Table 1 is very important for the manuscript however I cannot fully understand how you decided on the enviromental impact of each category. For example you give a very high risk for animal manure but good agricultural practices dictate no pahogens anyway (digested manure etc). for green based fertilzers are you also including food waste or not? it is not cler to me, if so then it should be clearly stated if not then where is food waste in? Finally for biosolids which is a very important part, the problem is not only metals but other organic pollutants also. I understand that you give some more information on the text after the actula table but specific for biosolids please try and include some information given in the following

https://environment.ec.europa.eu/topics/waste-and-recycling/sewage-sludge_en

Tran et al Occurrence and fate of emerging contaminants in municipal

wastewater treatment plants from different geographical regions-a review

Emmanouil et al  An Insight into Ingredients of Toxicological Interest in Personal Care Products and A Small–Scale Sampling Survey of the Greek Market: Delineating a Potential Contamination Source for Water Resources

minor to moderate corrections

Author Response

Please see attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

The manuscript has been reviewed, “Rooted in Nature: The Rise, Challenges, and Potential of Organic Fertilizers in Agricultural Ecosystems”and hope the suggestion can provide useful comments to help strengthen your manuscript. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the organic farming system, including its development, challenges, and detailed examination of organic fertilizer sources commonly used in crop production. It will explore the properties and categorization of commercially available organic fertilizers, research insights on vegetable crop performance and address the current challenges and future recommendations. The paper also adds the autho’s perspective about organic farming and its broader implications. At the same time there is room for improvement before the article is published.

1. In the manuscript, "3.4 and 3.5" both contain economic issues and it is suggested that the authors merge them in order to make the manuscript clear and concise.

2. The meaning of "4.1 and 4.2" is repetitive It is proposed to amend 4.2 to read "Organic fertilizer components".

3. The relationship between Part 5 of the manuscript and the research objectives is?

4. Lines 620-643: The section is not strongly linked to the Perspective and Future .

5.In the manuscript, the authors mention the economic benefits of organic farming as well as the economic pressures;which is more important?

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report (Previous Reviewer 3)

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of organic farming and its impact on nutrient management, food security, and sustainability. The paper presents a valuable contribution to the ongoing discourse on organic farming and sustainable agricultural practices.

 I want to suggest that the author implement the suggestion hereunder:

• In the updated version of the manuscript, one of the comments of Reviewer 3 is not implemented by the author. {Line 351, Rosen and Bierman, 2005, was not available in the reference section}
• In the section on economic and logistical concerns (lines 243-247), the paper could provide more concrete examples and data to substantiate the claims made.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report (Previous Reviewer 4)

Dear Editor, the authors have greatly improved the manuscript compared to the first version previously submitted. They've done a great job now.

Only one detail that must be modified is in the Figure the acronym P, related to the p-value is lowercase.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

The manuscript has been reviewed, “Rooted in Nature: The Rise, Challenges, and Potential of Organic Farming and Fertilizers in Agroecosystems”and hope the suggestion can provide useful comments to help strengthen your manuscript. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the organic farming system, including its development, challenges, and detailed examination of organic fertilizer sources commonly used in crop production. The study also explores the properties and categorization of commercially available organic fertilizers, considering those listed by OMRI and their certification or approval process. The discussion incorporates research insights on vegetable crop performance and addresses the current challenges and future recommendations. The paper also adds the author’s perspective on organic farming and its broader implications. At the same time there is room for improvement before the article is published.

1. “ 2.2 Current Trends and Statistics”The section mainly describes the current situation and trends of organic fertilizers, but such a title does not meet the requirements of the writing, and it is recommended to replace it with something like "Trends in Development".

2. It is recommended that the authors condense the conclusions in the“Perspective and Future”section to minimize the occurrence of repetitive statements with the above.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is an interesting review on a important matter. please see the following comments

-the most important drawback of the review is that the title is misleading and the actual review is not focused enough. It is supposed to be about organic fertilizers which is a broad category per se but at least half of the manuscript is about organic farming in general. this is not the same and the focus of such a wide scientific topic becomes wider

In 4.2. Commercially available major organic fertilizers you analyze some available organic fertilizers. I cannot understand why you do not cite manure (different kinds), biosolids (different kinds), composts (different kinds especially from food refuse). this is extremely strange to me

The presentation of the actual economic values is only relevant for the specific time point mentioned and it is of no use for projecting evaluation of these products

medium change needed

Reviewer 2 Report

Review suggestion

The manuscript has been reviewed,“Rooted in Nature: The Rise, Challenges, and Potential of Organic Fertilizers in Agricultural Ecosystems”and hope the suggestion can provide useful comments to help strengthen your manuscript.This paper will delve into organic fertilizer sources commonly used in crop production, properties and categorization of commercially available organic fertilizers, research insights on vegetable crop performance with organic fertilizers, and address current challenges and future recommendations for commercial organic fertilizers in agroecosystems. This narrative review paper aims to highlight the diverse range of commercially available organic fertilizers and comparative data to guide growers in their organic farming endeavors.The manuscript integrates a large body of literature, but there are still details to be modified before publication.

1. Lines 20-25:“Furthermore, the paper highlights the challenges organic farmers face, including nutrient management, pest and disease control, and market access, offering potential strategies for mitigation”What parts of the manuscript are specifically referred to in the manuscript?

2. Lines 71-72: The title is "A Contemporary Overview of Organic Farming", but it includes "Historical Development", which is a contradiction in terms.

3. The manuscript lacks the heading "3/6".

4. The authors were advised to revise the format of Table 1/3 to be consistent with Table 2. Also move Form Table 2 up to before 4.2.

5. Lines 350-351:This part of the data is close to 20 years old, is there more recent data that would enhance the persuasive power of the manuscript?

6. What is the definition of or distinction between high and low levels of "Yield Impact, Soil Health Impact, Environmental Impact, Long-term Costeffectiveness" in Table 3?

7. “This paper will delve into organic fertilizer sources commonly used in crop production, properties and categorization of commercially available organic fertilizers, research insights on vegetable crop performance with organic fertilizers, and address current challenges and future recommendations for commercial organic fertilizers in agroecosystems.”However, as part 2/3/5 of the manuscript is not very relevant to the study and occupies a significant amount of space, it is recommended that these two parts be retained at an appropriate length.

8. “This narrative review paper aims to highlight the diverse range of commercially available organic fertilizers and comparative data to guide growers in their organic farming endeavors.”The manuscript doesn't see much in the way of strong data comparisons.

9. The challenges of organic fertilizers are described so little in the text that it does not support the title of the article.

10. The authors of this review manuscript were encouraged to add their own perspectives and not a consolidation of the literature.

Reviewer 3 Report

Although this research is not entirely new, it is good and will be very helpful to aspiring researchers. The writing in the manuscript is admirable and orderly. I have a few little recommendations, which are as follows:

1)       The sources of organic fertilisers that are frequently used in crop production, their characteristics and classification, the performance of vegetable crops when fertilised with organic matter, as well as current issues and suggested solutions, are well represented and explained.

2)       In Section 2.2, the author used Y, R, and p in Figure 1 (Line 162), which was not defined in the graphical representation of global trends in sales of organic food and the total area of acreage.

3)       Line 351 (Rosen and Bierman, 2005) was not available in the reference section.

1)       Remove the typographical errors.

Reviewer 4 Report

Dear Editor and authors, the article is very biased in its writing, in order to make several inferences that are very limited, in a review different topics must be addressed, and this does not happen in the same way. The article only defends a cultivation system, without showing its limitations, so I see that it is a limited article to be published in a high impact factor journal like Sustainability. Below are some considerations

- The authors need to look at the advantages and disadvantages of the mentioned cultivation system, as a review as proposed needs to be broad and critical, and not simply highlight the advantages. The article seems like an opinion piece by the authors, where they want to show that all production must be converted to the organic system.

- Furthermore, there is a need to cite country legislation, because in many places for a product to be considered organic it needs to comply with a series of legislation.

- The information in line 60-62 is not true, because most organic fertilizers have low concentrations of nutrients, which requires high applied doses of this class of fertilizer, and their use is very limited to this aspect. Furthermore, the cost related to the waste production site to the application site can be high, which makes the use of organic fertilizers unviable.

- Furthermore, the authors need to highlight advantages and disadvantages for different crops, because for the production of vegetables due to production in smaller areas, the use of organic fertilizers may be sufficient, for large cultivation areas such as corn and soybeans, the organic system of cultivation presents several limitations.