The Effects of Urbanization on Urban Land Green Use Efficiency of Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration: Mechanism from the Technological Innovation

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 3)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The study examines the land use green efficiency in the Yangtze Delta region of China using panel data. The paper is well-structured and includes a substantial amount of quantitative analysis. However, before considering it for publication, the following issues need to be addressed:

1. Enhance the abstract: The abstract should begin by clearly stating the research topic and its significance. It should also mention the methodology and data used, as well as the key findings. Instead of merely listing the relationships among factors, try to interpret the results.

 

2. Clarify the concept of urban land green use efficiency: Provide a more detailed explanation of the origin, meaning, and application of this term. Establish a research framework and explain the rationale behind the chosen methodology.

3. Clearly specify inputs and data sources: Clearly list and explain the inputs and data sources used in the study before discussing the mediation model. Provide a clear justification for why these particular inputs and data sources were chosen.

4. Improve language usage: Pay attention to the language used in the paper. Correct errors such as referring to "computer employee," which seems incorrect in the given context.

By addressing these issues, the paper will be better positioned for publication.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The language of the paper needs improvements.

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

We gratefully thank you for time spending in making constructive remarks and insightful suggestions, which has significantly raised the quality of the manuscript and has enable us to improve the manuscript. Each suggested revision and comment was accurately incorporated and considered. The manuscript has undergone English language editing by MDPI. We have checked carefully that all references are relevant to the contents of the manuscript. Below the comments of the reviewers are response point by point and the revisions are indicated.

Thank you again for considering our work and hope you and your family in good health.

1. Enhance the abstract: The abstract should begin by clearly stating the research topic and its significance. It should also mention the methodology and data used, as well as the key findings. Instead of merely listing the relationships among factors, try to interpret the results.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for comment. We rewrote the abstract, from the research purpose, measurement methods and intermediary analysis methods, research areas and data, findings, interpretation of the results and policy recommendations (Lines 5-20).

 

2. Comment: Clarify the concept of urban land green use efficiency: Provide a more detailed explanation of the origin, meaning, and application of this term. Establish a research framework and explain the rationale behind the chosen methodology.

Reply: Thanks so much for your rigorous comment. We added the research background of ULGUE in the introduction (line 49), and added the origin of green development, and concept, core content and application of ULGUE. We added the research framework, which is established from four steps (line 257), The research framework can be seen in Figure 1 (line 268).

In the method part, the SBM-DEA method is introduced in detail (line 305). DEA model has been widely used in the study of the environment and land use because of its advantages in dealing with multilevel inputs and outputs. The current studies find that most of the traditional DEA models commonly used to measure land use efficiency are radial or angular, ignoring the undesired outputs. SBM model provides an accurate measure of the efficiency value under undesirable output constraints. Therefore, on this basis, some scholars have proposed the SBM-DEA model to consider undesired out-puts such as environmental pollution as a way to explore the green use of urban land and sustainable development.

3. Comment: Clearly specify inputs and data sources: Clearly list and explain the inputs and data sources used in the study before discussing the mediation model. Provide a clear justification for why these particular inputs and data sources were chosen.;

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for the suggestion. We refine the indicators, and clearly explain the meaning of outputs and reference in Table 2 (line 329). We describe the data sources needed for indicators (line 289).

 

4. Improve language usage: Pay attention to the language used in the paper. Correct errors such as referring to "computer employee," which seems incorrect in the given context.

Reply: Thanks so much for your careful check, we are sorry for the inconvenience brought to you. The full text was checked and revised according to the comment, and the manuscript had undergone English language editing by MDPI. We modified the inappropriate expressions in the text to make it more in line with the reading habits of English readers. We replaced computer employee with computer staff (line 294).

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report (New Reviewer)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article concerns the impact of urbanization on the efficiency of green use of urban areas. The research attempted to identify mechanisms resulting from technological innovation.

In this paper authors puts two the research hypotheses: Hypothesis 1: Urbanization can significantly promote the improvement of urban land green use efficiency . Hypothesis 2: Green technology innovation, digital technology innovation and transport technology innovation can amplify the positive impact of urbanization on urban land green use efficiency.

According to the authors, these hypotheses were confirmed

Detailed comments:

1. The article lacks a clearly defined research goal.

2. The research results should clearly indicate which hypothesis has been proven (1) or (2), not (original).

3. With so much literature in the Introduction and Literature Review, the discussion should refer more broadly to research by other authors. In the current version of the article, the authors referred to only a few studies.

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

We gratefully thank you for time spending in making constructive remarks and insightful suggestions, which has significantly raised the quality of the manuscript and has enable us to improve the manuscript. Each suggested revision and comment was accurately incorporated and considered. The manuscript has undergone English language editing by MDPI. We have checked carefully that all references are relevant to the contents of the manuscript. Below the comments of the reviewers are response point by point and the revisions are indicated.

Thank you again for considering our work and hope you and your family in good health.

1. Comment: The article lacks a clearly defined research goal.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable suggestion. We added the research goal in the last paragraph of the Introduction: This study measures the ULGUE of 26 cities in the China’s Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration (YRDUA) from 2006-2019, and aims to analyze the mediating role and impact mechanisms of three types of technological innovation (line 96).

 

2. Comment: The research results should clearly indicate which hypothesis has been proven (1) or (2), not (original).

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. In the section-4, result, we point out that hypothesis 1 is confirmed after test, which indicate significance at the statistical level of 5%, (line 385), and hypothesis 2 is confirmed after test, too (line 416).

 

3. Comment: With so much literature in the Introduction and Literature Review, the discussion should refer more broadly to research by other authors. In the current version of the article, the authors referred to only a few studies.

Reply: Thank you for your pertinent advice! We have enriched the Discussion (Line 467). Specifically, in the Discussion part, we added references and discussions to the existing research on the issues of ULGUE in YRDUA, relationship between ULGUE and demographic urbanization, and application and expansion of the technological innovations.

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article explores the impact of urbanization on the efficiency of green land use in cities using green innovation mechanisms. We used a model to calculate and analyze the impact of urbanization on ULGUE, and explored the relationship between green technology innovation, digital technology innovation, and transportation technology innovation with ULGUE. The research content is relatively complete, and the author has in-depth thinking on the problem being studied, but there are still some parts of the article that are not explained clearly. The overall idea of the article is relatively clear, but it still needs to be modified to a certain extent. Specific suggestions are as follows:

1. It is recommended to add a research area to the title.

2. Lines 4-15: It is recommended to explain the connotations of green expected output and green unexpected output in the abstract.

3. Lines 20-47: In the first paragraph of the introduction, only the research background of urbanization is introduced. It is suggested to add a description of the background related to ULGUE.

4. Lines 29-30: "To accommodate the expected increase in urban population, developing countries need to expand urban land space by more than 300 percent." Where does the data come from? Please indicate the citation.

5. Line 87: "This study measures the ULGUE of 26 cities in the YRDUA..." Although "Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration (YRDUA)" has been mentioned in the abstract, line 87 is the first mention of the abbreviation YRDUA in the main text. It is recommended to add the full name Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration here.

6. Line100: The Literature Review section is too long, accounting for one-third of the effective content of the article, and the information density is too low, which is not proportional to the overall structure of the article. It is recommended to make revisions. Lines 101-109: There is a lot of repetition between this paragraph and the abstract and introduction sections. It is recommended to refine the text of this paragraph.

7. Line 126: The subheading of this section is about the direct impact of urbanization on the efficiency of urban green space utilization. The article covers three aspects: firstly, the impact of high waste and high emissions generated by urbanization on ULGUE; The second is that urbanization leads to an increase in population and has an impact on the environment; The third is that the government's understanding and management of urban green space utilization need to be improved.

The first two of the three aspects mentioned in the article are the "direct impact" brought about by urbanization, and I believe this viewpoint is correct. However, for the third aspect, the direct impact of urbanization on ULGUE was not mentioned, but rather the impact of government actions on ULGUE. At present, this point of content does not fit well with the subheadings. Please reorganize and modify it.

Figure 1: The clarity of Figure 1 needs to be improved, it is recommended to replace it. The build-up area and the altitude map of the research area are obstructed. It is recommended to use a different form of expression or break it down into two separate maps.

9. Line 297: "Industrial SO2", please note that it should be SO₂. Similar issues should be checked and corrected throughout the article.

10. Lines 299-301: "The data of the share of green patent applications is from the Chinese Research Data Services (CNRDS) Platform." It is recommended to include the website address of the data source for data from the platform.

11. Line 324: How is the "wave level" used here calculated or measured?

12. Lines 352-356: "Green technological innovation, using the share of green patent applications", "digital technological innovation, using the share of computer employees", "technological innovation, using the number of trains per 1000 people". Here, we use the proportion of green patent applications, the proportion of computer employees, and the number of trams per thousand people to represent green technology innovation, digital technology innovation, and transportation technology innovation. Is using a single indicator to represent various types of innovation too weak? Have any scholars studied like this before? Is there a reference that can support this content?

13. Lines 377: In 4 In the Result section, there is a lack of analysis on the impact mechanism of technological innovation on ULGUE. It is recommended to supplement.

14. Lines 427-440: This section states that as the population urbanization rate increases, ULGUE will also increase accordingly. "The estimation results show that the lagged one period resident urbanization rate has a significant positive effect on ULGUE." However, in the previous lines 157-159, "A large flux of people into urban areas creates challenges to the urban living and productive land use, which negatively affects the environment, and increases non desired outputs." The influx of population into urban areas has a negative impact on the environment.

However, the result shows that population density plays a significant negative effect on ULGUE, which is different from some studies, which suggestions that population density increases ULGUE through accelerating economic development. Is there any self contradiction in the content before and after? Please provide an explanation.

15. Line 441: The Discussion section is lengthy. It is recommended to write down the core of the discussion question in layers and subheadings. Additionally, the first paragraph of this section serves as a summary statement. Would it be more appropriate to place it in the Conclusion section?

16. Lines 443-445: "Combined with the previous theoretical analysis of the impact of urbanization on ULGUE, it can be inferred that the increase in social economic efficiency around urbanization in YRDUA is greater than its negative impact on land use..." Why does research with such strong limitations provide such macro guidance? What is the steady development of the stage of steady improvement?

17. Lines 463-465: "This has been improved from green and digital technological innovation, which fundamentally changes China's coal optimized energy structure by increasing the promotion of non fossil energy use." Can digital technological innovation alone solve such a large problem in the energy structure to such a large extent? Suggest modification, there are many similar issues.

18. Line 531: "Urbanization has a significant positive impact on the efficiency of green urban land use, but this impact is weak." Why does this place feel that the impact is weak, but some parts (such as line 448) directly claim to offset the negative impact on land use?

19. Line 574: What is the basis for "Government should increase the local capacity for independent innovation on the basis of promoting technological exchanges"? No direct evidence was found earlier.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Moderate editing of English language required

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

We gratefully thank you for time spending in making constructive remarks and insightful suggestions, which has significantly raised the quality of the manuscript and has enable us to improve the manuscript. Each suggested revision and comment was accurately incorporated and considered. The manuscript has undergone English language editing by MDPI. We have checked carefully that all references are relevant to the contents of the manuscript. Below the comments of the reviewers are response point by point and the revisions are indicated.

Thank you again for considering our work and hope you and your family in good health.

1. Comment: It is recommended to add a research area to the title.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable comment. We added and the Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration to the title as study area (Line 3).

2. Comment: Lines 4-15: It is recommended to explain the connotations of green expected output and green unexpected output in the abstract.

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. We explained the connotations of green desired output and green undesired output in the abstract (line 8). Green desired outputs are ecologically friendly output represented by green space, while green undesired outputs are mainly un-ecologically friendly outputs represented by industrial pollution.

3. Comment: In the first paragraph of the introduction, only the research background of urbanization is introduced. It is suggested to add a description of the background related to ULGUE.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable suggestion. We add a description of the background related to ULGUE (line 49): After the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the government used the concepts of green use and sustainable development to guide the contradiction between human beings and land, and promote the green development of regions and urban agglomerations. Since then, China have incorporated green use efficiency into development goals on the basis of economic efficiency of land use. Some scholars study the performance characteristics and influence of green development on land use, and urban land green use efficiency (ULGUE) has gradually become a new breakthrough point for land use research.

4. Comment: Lines 29-30: "To accommodate the expected increase in urban population, developing countries need to expand urban land space by more than 300 percent." Where does the data come from? Please indicate the citation.

Reply: Thank you so much for your careful check. The data is from UN Habitat cited as UN Habitat. (2020) World Cities Report 2022: Urban Planning for City Leaders[EB/OL]. https://urban-planning-for-city-leaders. We have added the reference (line 35).

5. Comment: Line 87: "This study measures the ULGUE of 26 cities in the YRDUA..." Although "Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration (YRDUA)" has been mentioned in the abstract, line 87 is the first mention of the abbreviation YRDUA in the main text. It is recommended to add the full name Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration here.

Reply: We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. We add the full name Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration and abbreviation (Line 96).

6. Comment: Line100: The Literature Review section is too long, accounting for one-third of the effective content of the article, and the information density is too low, which is not proportional to the overall structure of the article. It is recommended to make revisions. Lines 101-109: There is a lot of repetition between this paragraph and the abstract and introduction sections. It is recommended to refine the text of this paragraph.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your careful check. We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. We cut down the repetitive content and refined the text expression (line 112).

7. Comment: Line 126: The subheading of this section is about the direct impact of urbanization on the efficiency of urban green space utilization. The article covers three aspects: firstly, the impact of high waste and high emissions generated by urbanization on ULGUE; The second is that urbanization leads to an increase in population and has an impact on the environment; The third is that the government's understanding and management of urban green space utilization need to be improved.

The first two of the three aspects mentioned in the article are the "direct impact" brought about by urbanization, and I believe this viewpoint is correct. However, for the third aspect, the direct impact of urbanization on ULGUE was not mentioned, but rather the impact of government actions on ULGUE. At present, this point of content does not fit well with the subheadings. Please reorganize and modify it.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable suggestion. We changed the third point to “different modes of urbanization affect ULGUE in different ways” (line 169). Third, different modes of urbanization affect ULGUE in different ways. Urban sprawl leads negative externalities such as high energy consumption, which will reduce land use efficiency. Since the end of the 20th century, increasing land intensification activities have become an important factor affecting sustainable global growth. The process of urbanization in China is generally accompanied with a lack of development awareness of resource-saving, expansion of built-up areas and transport infrastructure areas and reduction in the marginal efficiency of land use. Urban compactness is a response to control urban sprawl, but it also leads to urban problems such as traffic congestion increased cost of living and the non-desired outputs of ULGUE. It has been shown that the eco-logical efficacy of urbanization in terms of pollution reduction and resource intensification can be better exploited through regulation and intervention by government departments. As present, over-exploitation and uncontrolled utilization of land resources in China have posed great challenges to regional sustainable development.

8. Comment: Figure 1: The clarity of Figure 1 needs to be improved, it is recommended to replace it. The build-up area and the altitude map of the research area are obstructed. It is recommended to use a different form of expression or break it down into two separate maps.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your careful check. We adjusted the definition and adjusted the construction area and altitude map to blank areas (line 286).

9. Comment: Line 297: "Industrial SO2", please note that it should be SO2. Similar issues should be checked and corrected throughout the article.

Reply: We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. We made the revise (line 293) and checked the spelling and academic norms of the whole text.

10. Comment: Lines 299-301: "The data of the share of green patent applications is from the Chinese Research Data Services (CNRDS) Platform." It is recommended to include the website address of the data source for data from the platform.

Reply: We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. We added the URL (https://www.cnrds.com) (line 297) of the data source and checked similar problems.

11. Comment: Line 324: How is the "wage level" used here calculated or measured?

Reply: Thanks for your rigorous advice. We use the average wage of employees in China City Statistical Yearbook to represent the wage level (line 323).

12. Comment: Lines 352-356: "Green technological innovation, using the share of green patent applications", "digital technological innovation, using the share of computer employees", "technological innovation, using the number of trains per 1000 people". Here, we use the proportion of green patent applications, the proportion of computer employees, and the number of trams per thousand people to represent green technology innovation, digital technology innovation, and transportation technology innovation. Is using a single indicator to represent various types of innovation too weak? Have any scholars studied like this before? Is there a reference that can support this content?

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. The number of patents is the most common innovation index, which has long been used to measure innovation (Ernst, H. (2001) Patent applications and subsequent changes of performance: evidence from time-series cross-section analyses on the firm level. Research Policy, 30, 143–157; Schoenecker, T. and Swanson, L. (2002) Indicators of firm technological capability: validity and performance implications. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management. 49, 1: 36–44; Tseng, CY, Wu, LY. (2007) Innovation quality in the automobile industry: measurement indicators and performance implications. International Journal of Technology Management. 37:162-177.).

Vehicle electrification is a promising technology, which involves the improvement of many environmental problems, including global climate change and oil demand, as well as urban air quality and noise pollution (Simone et al. (2013) Socio-technical inertia: Understanding the barriers to electric vehicles. 60: 531-539; Tzeng, GH., et al. (2005) Multi-criteria analysis of alternative-fuel buses for public transportation. Energy Policy. 33(11): 1373-1383.). According to the practice in China, bus electrification is an ongoing green utilization and innovative application of government.

Usually, the infrastructure construction of digital technology is represented by the number of Internet users (Rose, J., Jones, M. and Furneaux, B. (2016). An integrated model of innovation drivers for smaller software firms. Information and Management. 53(3) 307-323.), and digital technology is driven by employees (Erik Opland et al. Employee-driven digital innovation: A systematic review and a research agenda Leif. Journal of Business Research 143 (2022) 255–271). Inspired by the above viewpoints, this study uses computer staff to represent the innovation level of digital technology.

This study intends to present the multiple meanings of innovation in different ways. We fully understand the reviewers' consideration of a single indicator, and we point out this deficiency in the limitations, and formulate more realistic innovation indicators and measurement methods in future research (line 621).

13. Comment: Lines 377: In 4 In the Result section, there is a lack of analysis on the impact mechanism of technological innovation on ULGUE. It is recommended to supplement.

Reply: Thanks for your rigorous advice. In the section 4, we added two influencing mechanisms of technological innovation on ULGUE: restrain energy consumption and alleviate pollution (line 443). The facilitating mechanisms can be explained in two ways:

(1) Restrain energy consumption. Urbanization not only produces economic and social benefits, but also produces huge energy consumption, and general technological innovation magnifies two effects at the same time because of the "rebound effect". Green technology innovation reduces energy consumption through energy saving; Digital technology innovation improves energy structure, increases energy utilization efficiency and promotes public transport planning; Traffic facilities are the intermediary between productive and polluted land elements and cities. Traffic technology innovation represented by public transportation electrification can effectively reduce the dependence and pollution of traffic facilities on fossil energy such as oil. The comprehensive application of the innovations not only meets the energy demand in the process of urbanization, but also improves the energy structure of urbanization and avoids the rebound effect to some extent.

(2) Alleviate pollution. When the population size exceeds the land carrying capacity, the positive impact of population on ULGUE may be less than the negative impact of congestion and environmental degradation. Local governments tend to alleviate urban congestion by expanding the scale of urban areas and transferring highly polluting industries, but the measures to transfer problems have not been effective for a long time. Green technology innovation reduces pollution through emission reduction and alleviates the negative impact of urbanization on land carrying capacity and balance. The innovation of digital technology and transportation technology enhances the agglomeration effect of elements and the diffusion of knowledge by improving the accessibility and liquidity among regions and shortening the spatial distance, and gives full play to the spatial spillover of ULGUE.

14. Comment: Lines 427-440: This section states that as the population urbanization rate increases, ULGUE will also increase accordingly. "The estimation results show that the lagged one period resident urbanization rate has a significant positive effect on ULGUE." However, in the previous lines 157-159, "A large flux of people into urban areas creates challenges to the urban living and productive land use, which negatively affects the environment, and increases non desired outputs." The influx of population into urban areas has a negative impact on the environment. However, the result shows that population density plays a significant negative effect on ULGUE, which is different from some studies, which suggestions that population density increases ULGUE through accelerating economic development. Is there any self contradiction in the content before and after? Please provide an explanation.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your rigorous comment. As a factor of production, population will have a positive impact on the economic efficiency of land use. However, the final impact of population on ULGUE may be both positive and negative. The empirical results of YRDUA show that with the increase of demographic urbanization rate, ULGUE will also increase accordingly. At the same time, the same result is obtained by using the urbanization rate of residents who lag behind for a period as an independent variable in the robustness test. Therefore, we believe that population agglomeration in the process of urbanization has indeed had a positive impact on ULGUE.

Urbanization has at least two meanings. One is the expansion of urban area, which leads to the increase of urban area and population. The other is the increase in population per unit area, i.e., the increase in population density. Different forms of urbanization have different ways to promote and challenge the green use of land. In the past 30 years, most cities in YRDUA are developing rapidly. On the one hand, the urban space is expanding rapidly, and there may be two phenomena of increasing population size and decreasing population density at the same time, which has a completely different influence direction. On the other hand, the unreasonable planning between different compact functional areas in some cities has generally caused congestion and prolonged commuting time during the rush hour, which has a negative impact on ULGUE. Some scholars in China put forward a similar view that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the compactness of urban spatial form and urban livability, that is, in the initial stage of urbanization, cities will become more and more livable with the compactness of urban spatial form, but with the development of urban scale to a certain extent, more compact spatial form will make cities more uninhabitable. Evidence from Shanghai has confirmed this view (Sun, Bindong. Urban spatial form and urban livability: from the perspective of uneconomical agglomeration. https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_10132761). We attach great importance to your comments on population density, and its influence is profound and complicated. We have added this part of the discussion (line 499).

15. Comment: Line 441: The Discussion section is lengthy. It is recommended to write down the core of the discussion question in layers and subheadings. Additionally, the first paragraph of this section serves as a summary statement. Would it be more appropriate to place it in the Conclusion section?

Reply: Thank you for your pertinent advice. We condensed three subheadings: ULGUE in YRDUA, Relationship between ULGUE and demographic urbanization and Application and expansion of the technological innovations, and improved the content of the Discussion (line 468). The first paragraph of this part has been modified and put in the conclusion part.

16. Comment: Lines 443-445: "Combined with the previous theoretical analysis of the impact of urbanization on ULGUE, it can be inferred that the increase in social economic efficiency around urbanization in YRDUA is greater than its negative impact on land use..." Why does research with such strong limitations provide such macro guidance? What is the steady development of the stage of steady improvement?

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. We are inspired by two articles on the analysis of ULGUE spatio-temporal characteristics (Xu., et al., 2023 [9]; Zeng., 2022 [15]); which proved that ULGUE in the east is in a stable and good development stage. Unfortunately, we didn't make it clear and deleted the unclear expression.

17. Comment: Lines 463-465: "This has been improved from green and digital technological innovation, which fundamentally changes China's coal optimized energy structure by increasing the promotion of non-fossil energy use." Can digital technological innovation alone solve such a large problem in the energy structure to such a large extent? Suggest modification, there are many similar issues.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your careful advice. We are so eager to express our expectation of promoting reform that we have exaggerated the expression. We have revised the imprecise expression (line 487).

18. Comment: Line 531: "Urbanization has a significant positive impact on the efficiency of green urban land use, but this impact is weak." Why does this place feel that the impact is weak, but some parts (such as line 448) directly claim to offset the negative impact on land use?

Reply: Thank you very much for your rigorous advice. Due to repeated revisions by authors, the unification of words before and after is not careful enough, which leads to a decline in readability of the manuscript. We feel very sorry for this. We deleted the inconsistent descriptions based on the comment 15, adjusted the related descriptions in the first paragraph of the Conclusion, and corrected the related descriptions in the follow-up:” Urbanization has a significant positive impact on the efficiency of urban green land use. Combined with the theoretical analysis of the influence of urbanization on ULGUE, it can be inferred that the improvement of social and economic benefits brought by urbanization in the YRDUA is greater than its negative impact on land use. In this process, technological innovation has restrained energy consumption and environmental pollution” (line 572).

19. Comment: Line 574: What is the basis for "Government should increase the local capacity for independent innovation on the basis of promoting technological exchanges"? No direct evidence was found earlier.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your careful check. The policy path of China is to pilot first and then popularize. At present, the focus of the policy on green use is to promote the green use of land in key areas, such as Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, YRDUA, Guangdong- Hong Kong-Macao. The effectiveness of local pilot projects is the key to determine whether a policy can continue to be promoted. Considering this point, this study gives the above suggestions, but it is not clearly stated in the article. Therefore, we revised this sentence to "in the long term, the governments should promote interregional technology exchanges, enhance regional innovation factor agglomeration and application capacity, and incorporate the promotion of green use into the planning and incentives for technological innovation." (line 615)

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 4 Report (New Reviewer)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

“The effects of urbanization on urban land green use efficiency: 2 mechanism from the technological innovation”

Urban greenery is an important factor influencing the quality of human life in cities, at the same time, greenery in cities must compete with other forms of land use. For this reason, research on urban land green use efficiency is important in order to identify factors that can increase this efficiency.
The reviewed manuscript is part of the research on this topic, constituting a valuable contribution to knowledge in this field - focusing on technological innovations.

The study seems to be well designed (and implemented) both in terms of the proposed (and used) methodology and the presentation of the obtained research results. Below are some comments that should help improve the final quality of the manuscript:

Introduction – with a separate literature review – without any reservations. The authors may focus too much on the results of research by Chinese scientists and research on China, but references to other research are also visible.

Methodology. The authors use the abbreviation SMB (e.g. line 313), but this model is not described before. It is also advisable to provide more information about the construction of the DEA model, because it is the basis for some of the solutions used by the authors.

The results (summarized in Tables 5 and 6) are unremarkable.

The discussion and conclusions are justified by the results obtained. But should political implications be part of a scientific study?

The level of English is good.

In my opinion, the manuscript is suitable for publication after a few minor corrections and additions.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The level of English is good (in my opinion).

Author Response

Dear reviewer:

We gratefully thank you for time spending in making constructive remarks and insightful suggestions, which has significantly raised the quality of the manuscript and has enable us to improve the manuscript. Each suggested revision and comment was accurately incorporated and considered. The manuscript has undergone English language editing by MDPI. We have checked carefully that all references are relevant to the contents of the manuscript. Below the comments of the reviewers are response point by point and the revisions are indicated.

Thank you again for considering our work and hope you and your family in good health.

1. Comment: Introduction – with a separate literature review – without any reservations. The authors may focus too much on the results of research by Chinese scientists and research on China, but references to other research are also visible.

Reply: Thanks for your rigorous suggestion. Your suggestion is helpful to broaden the horizon of this study. We added the related research of other scholars, including background of ULGUE (line 52) in the Introduction and relationship between ULGUE and demographic urbanization, application and expansion of the technological innovations in the Discussion (lines 492-564).

2. Comment: Methodology. The authors use the abbreviation SMB (e.g. line 313), but this model is not described before. It is also advisable to provide more information about the construction of the DEA model, because it is the basis for some of the solutions used by the authors.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your careful check. We add the source and explanation of SBM-DEA model. DEA is a systematic analysis method based on Farrell’s nonparametric analysis theory and was proposed by Charnes et al., in 1978, which DEA model has been widely used in the study of the environment and land use because of its advantages in dealing with multilevel inputs and outputs. The current studies find that most of the traditional DEA models commonly used to measure land use efficiency are radial or angular, ignoring the undesired outputs. SBM model provides an accurate measure of the efficiency value under undesirable output constraints. Therefore, on this basis, some scholars have proposed the SBM-DEA model to consider undesired out-puts such as environmental pollution as a way to explore the green use of urban land and sustainable development (lines 308-316).

3. Comment: The results (summarized in Tables 5 and 6) are unremarkable.

Reply: Thanks for your rigorous suggestion. We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. We screened the results of random effect model and fixed effect model according to the Hausman test, and these models are significant in the Table 5 and 6. In order not to make the results ambiguous, we marked the significance of the coefficients in Figure 3 (line 360).

4. Comment: The discussion and conclusions are justified by the results obtained. But should political implications be part of a scientific study?

Reply: Thank you for your pertinent comment. As an applied study, the results of this study have direct policy implications, so we added the content of policy implications. But as you said, there really shouldn't be too much political meaning, and therefore we have deleted some inappropriate expressions and radical views.

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 3)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thanks for the revision

Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Accept in present form

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

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript “The effects of population urbanization on urban land green use efficiency: mechanism from the technological innovation” is very interesting, by showing the impact of population urbanization on the efficiency of green land use and the mechanisms by which technological innovations, in general, and green, digital and transport technology innovations contribute to these impacts.

The article is understandable, and the results are described in detail and clarity. However, some changes and suggestions should be preferred:

- The text should be more formal, eliminating the adjectives “our” and the pronouns “we”, and reorganizing the respective sentences;

- Some sentences must be reorganized because their meaning is not very clear or seem to be incomplete, characterized, for example, by the absence of the verb. It is suggested also to make a check of the punctuation marks and the spaces between words and brackets;

- Make a check of the references in the text;

- Can you explain the methodology clearly? It is suggested to fill in a graphical scheme of the methodology.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thanks very much for your time to review this manuscript. I really appreciate all your comments and suggestions! Please find itemized responses in below, and my corrections in the re-submitted files, where all modifications are marked in blue.

1. Comment: The text should be more formal, eliminating the adjectives “our” and the pronouns “we”, and reorganizing the respective sentences.

Reply: Thank you for the text suggested, we are sorry for the text error. The adjectives “our” and the pronouns “we” from the precedent version have been replaced (Line 408, Page 11), and some statements are overridden according to comment2.

 

2. Comment: Some sentences must be reorganized because their meaning is not very clear or seem to be incomplete, characterized, for example, by the absence of the verb. It is suggested also to make a check of the punctuation marks and the spaces between words and brackets.

Reply: Thanks so much for your careful check, we are sorry for the inconvenience brought to you. The full text was checked and revised according to the comment.

 

3. Comment: Make a check of the references in the text;

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for comment. The references were checked and modified throughout the text.

 

4. Comment: Can you explain the methodology clearly? It is suggested to fill in a graphical scheme of the methodology.

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. Regarding the suggestion about the method, we added a description of the methodology as follows: Mediation model was used to analyze the facilitators and influencing processes of ULGUE in urbanization [13]. In terms of concrete steps, given that sometimes it is not appropriate to test the effect of M-Y, and the appropriate approach is to report the mediating effect directly and provide a mechanistic explanation [92], thus this study draws on a common mathematical test method proposed by Baron and Kenny [93] and mechanism analysis approach [94]. First (equation (1)), this study tests the direct impact of urbanization on ULGUE, a potential mediating effect can only be indicated if β₁ is significant can be followed by the presence of a mediating effect. Second (equation (2)), this study tests the impact of urbanization on each mediating variable (M) including green technological innovation (Gtech), digital technological innovation, and if the β₂ are significant, it implies that there is an effect of urbanization on the mediating variable of technological innovation, Third, there are theoretical analyses of the mechanistic effects of M on ULGUE instead of mathematical test (Lines 334-346, page 8). Methodology diagram has been added as the Figure2 (Line 354, page 9) as below.

 

Figure 2 Mediation model for independent explanatory variable Purban, mediating variables M, and explained variable ULGUE.

Note: *, **, *** indicate significance at the statistical level of 10%, 5%, 1%, respectively.

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The current paper is not a scientific paper, but like an engineering report. I recommend rejecting it which cannot meet the standard of this journal. Please reorganize and rewrite the paper.

1.      Introduction: please review the previous studies and focus on the methods. Please compare the advantages and disadvantages of these studies, then propose your contributions. The second Section is also like Introduction or literature review.

2.      The paper writing is also messy. Please carefully follow the journal template. Please carefully check how to cite the references such as:

protection of environmental resources such as[9,10],

but they cannot fully compensate for[22,23,24]

respond to the complex process of land use[e.g. 33,84]

3.      The methods/analyses are also simple. Please add some figures/maps and do some spatial analysis.

4.      The Discussion section should be improved which is not a real discussion about the results.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thanks very much for your time to review this manuscript. I really appreciate all your comments and suggestions! Please find itemized responses in below, and my corrections in the re-submitted files, where all modifications are marked in blue.

1. Comment: Introduction: please review the previous studies and focus on the methods. Please compare the advantages and disadvantages of these studies, then propose your contributions. The second Section is also like Introduction or literature review.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable suggestion. We have revised the Introduction (Lines 48-100) and literature review (Lines 111-269) according to the comments.

In the Introduction, we review existing studies about ULGUE that focus on spatiotemporal characteristics and drivers. The studies find that ULGUE values show a first decline and then an increase in time [14], which is consistent with China's development path of polluting first and governing later, and ULGUE values show a gradual decrease from the eastern coast to the western interior [15], which is a comprehensive reflection of the gap between the East and the West in terms of industrial structure, level of economic development, level of urbanization and government investment. Methods for measuring ULGUE and analyzing drivers were compared, and DEA method and mediation model were found to be more appropriate for the purpose of this study. Some studies analyze the significant positive correlation noted between the technological innovation and ULGUE [10,17]. However, the process mechanism of technological innovation in the impact of urbanization on land use has not been fully elucidated. On this basis, three contributions of this study are presented: (1) a systematic review of the mechanism of urbanization's impact on ULGUE; (2) the measurement of ULGUE integrates green desired output and non-green desired output to get a deeper understanding of ULGUE, and (3) revealing the roles of different technological innovations on ULGUE, and elaborates in-depth on the mediating roles of green, digital, and transportation technological innovations.

In literature review, we have enhanced summary and comparison of the existing literature. We rewrote the section of direct impact of urbanization on ULGUE by summarizing the consensus and gaps of existing researches, in order to present the focus of this study on ULGUE.

 

2. Comment: The paper writing is also messy. Please carefully follow the journal template. Please carefully check how to cite the references.

Reply: Thanks so much for your careful check, we are sorry for the inconvenience brought to you. The full text was checked and revised according to the comment, and the references were checked and modified throughout the text.

 

3. Comment: The methods/analyses are also simple. Please add some figures/maps and do some spatial analysis.

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. Considering that the existing studies on spatiotemporal characteristics of ULGUE are more complete, The studies find that ULGUE values show a first decline and then an increase in time [14], which is consistent with China's development path of polluting first and governing later, and ULGUE values show a gradual decrease from the eastern coast to the western interior [15], which is a comprehensive reflection of the gap between the East and the West in terms of industrial structure, level of economic development, level of urbanization and government investment. Therefore we did not repeat the spatial research in this study. We totally understand your insightful concern, and we have focused on adding the analyses of existing studies on spatiotemporal characteristics in the introduction (Lines 62-71, page 2), and adding a description of the methodology (Lines 334-346, page 8), a map of the study area (Figure 1, Line 290, page 8), and a schematic of the methodology (Figure 2, Line 354, page 9) in section3.

 

 

4. Comment: The Discussion section should be improved which is not a real discussion about the results.

Reply: Thank you for your pertinent advice! We have rewritten the Discussion (Lines 438-514, pp13-14). Firstly, the logical relevance and specificity of the empirical results of URDUA with the existing studies are analyzed. Secondly, the logical relationships of the variables, especially their differences with the existing studies are discussed and explained. Based on the analyses, the study provides an in-depth discussion of the pathways and barriers to realizing the mediating role of green, digital and transport technology innovations.

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper analyzes land use efficiency in the Yangtze River region of China, utilizing panel data. This concept bears notable significance and is structured coherently in the paper. However, certain aspects require further clarification prior to considering the paper for publication.

1) The authors are advised to specify the exact sources of each set of data instead of making generalized references to them. For instance, greater particulars should be provided for sources of data concerning urban land use, density, built-up areas, and green land, among others. Also, the constituents of 'green land', such as parks, agriculture, and water, ought to be clearly stated.

2) The authors should provide a balanced discussion in their paper, consisting of both the strengths and limitations of their chosen methodology. Existing references should be utilized to make comparisons and establish how the proposed method excels compared to other similar studies.

3) The logical link between land use and industrial categories seems opaque. As such, the authors are required to elucidate the rationale and methodology in a more cogent and lucid manner.

4) Lastly, it would be beneficial to supplement the 'Study Area' section (3.1) with a map rather than a table, for more effective and visual representation of the area under study.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The language of the paper needs to be polished. Some of the expressions need to be verified. For instance, the term "population urbanization". Has tit been used widely by other native english speaking scholars in the study field?

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thanks very much for your time to review this manuscript. I really appreciate all your comments and suggestions! Please find itemized responses in below, and my corrections in the re-submitted files, where all modifications are marked in blue.

1. Comment: The authors are advised to specify the exact sources of each set of data instead of making generalized references to them. Also, the constituents of 'green land', such as parks, agriculture, and water, ought to be clearly stated.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable comment. We have specified the exact sources of each set of data (Lines 295-306, Page 7), Which comes from official statistics, such as China Urban Statistical Yearbook, Chinese Research Data Services Platform. According to the Urban Green Space Planning Standards issued by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development of China, green land includes park, green buffer, square space and attached green space (Lines 142-143, Page3), which has been adopted in the existing literature (e.g. Xu, Y., Lei, G., 2018). Citation of the literature is followed: Xu, Y., Lei, G. (2018) Study on Evolution of Urban Land Structure in Liaozhongnan City Groups. Econ. Geogr. 38, 69–77.

 

2. Comment: The authors should provide a balanced discussion in their paper, consisting of both the strengths and limitations of their chosen methodology. Existing references should be utilized to make comparisons and establish how the proposed method excels compared to other similar studies.

Reply: Thank you for your rigorous consideration. We have reviewed existing studies about ULGUE that focus on spatiotemporal characteristics and drivers. Methods for measuring ULGUE and analyzing drivers were compared. Compared to single-factor measures, DEA is more capable of reflecting the land use system at a holistic level and is the dominant measurement method for ULGUE. Mediation model facilitates the description of the process of specific facilitators on the basis of causal linkages, which is found to be more appropriate for the purpose of this study (Lines 51-61, Page 2).

 

3. Comment: The logical link between land use and industrial categories seems opaque. As such, the authors are required to elucidate the rationale and methodology in a more cogent and lucid manner.

Reply: We gratefully appreciate for your valuable suggestion. Industrial land grant size is an important influence on industrial pollution such as industrial smoke and dust, which is perceived positive impact on land use efficiency and negative impact on ULGUE, and considered an important indicator for evaluating the efficiency of industrial land use and output levels [95]. (Lines 368-372, Page 9)

Regarding the suggestion about the method, we added a description of the methodology as follows: Mediation model was used to analyze the facilitators and influencing processes of ULGUE in urbanization [13]. In terms of concrete steps, given that sometimes it is not appropriate to test the effect of M-Y, and the appropriate approach is to report the mediating effect directly and provide a mechanistic explanation [92], thus this study draws on a common mathematical test method proposed by Baron and Kenny [93] and mechanism analysis approach [94]. First (equation (1)), this study tests the direct impact of urbanization on ULGUE, a potential mediating effect can only be indicated if β₁ is significant can be followed by the presence of a mediating effect. Second (equation (2)), this study tests the impact of urbanization on each mediating variable (M) including green technological innovation (Gtech), digital technological innovation, and if the β₂ are significant, it implies that there is an effect of urbanization on the mediating variable of technological innovation, Third, there are theoretical analyses of the mechanistic effects of M on ULGUE instead of mathematical test (Lines 334-346, page 8). Methodology diagram has been added as the Figure2 (Line 354, page 9) as below.

 

4. Comment: It would be beneficial to supplement the 'Study Area' section (3.1) with a map rather than a table, for more effective and visual representation of the area under study.

Reply: Thank you so much for your careful check. We have added the map of study area as Figure 1 (Line 290, Page 7).

 

 

5. Comment: Some of the expressions need to be verified. For instance, the term "population urbanization". Has it been used widely by other native English speaking scholars in the study field?

Reply: We feel sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. With apologies for not adopting a more generic concept, we have modified the term “population urbanization” to “urbanization” throughout the text; noted that it is urbanization in the sense of population growth in this study. We have checked the text to avoid a similar situation.

Thanks again for your valuable comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx