Employing Binary Logistic Regression in Modeling the Effectiveness of Agricultural Extension in Clove Farming: Facts and Findings from Sidrap Regency, Indonesia

POINT-BY-POINT RESPONSES TO THE COMMENTS/SUGGESTIONS

REVIEWER#1

A. The REVIEWER#1’S COMMENTS/ SUGGESTIONS

RESPONSES

Position in the pdf Manuscripts*

A GRATITUDE EXPRESSION

We are grateful for your important suggestions for our manuscript. Your feedback is invaluable, and it has helped us enhance the quality and clarity of the article. Your comments have provided insightful and valuable viewpoints, enhancing this work and providing key insights for future research development. We have comprehensively examined the research article and applied considerable revisions to the manuscript on the comments/suggestions offered by REVIEWER#1

Thank you so much for your comments and criticism. They are very constructive for us. An ideal abstract’s content includes a complete description of a research process and results. Unfortunately, the maximum number of words for the abstract in this journal is 200 words (see below). So, it is difficult for us to include everything you are suggesting. Now, the number of words in the abstract is precisely 200.

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Thank you very much for your comments. Below are our responses to them point by point:

a.      why [did] they study “clove farming.” Our response:  In the introduction section, we discussed the importance of clove farming in Indonesia.  Indonesia is mentioned as one of the countries that produces the most cloves, yet the quantity of cloves produced is low.  Furthermore, cloves are important to Indonesian farmers because smallholders grow the majority of the cloves (98%). This is one of the contexts/backgrounds in which we studied clove farming.

b.      why [did] they focus on “Sidrap Regency, Indonesia.” Our response: As you might already know, this research was self-financing. So, the primary reason we concentrated our research on Sidrap Regency was its accessibility.  It is nearer to Makassar, the city where we live. It was more accessible than other regencies in the Province of South Sulawesi, Indonesia.  The second reason is that we have not found any agricultural extension research fields in the current literature on clove farming in the regency. 

c.      whether their sample of “140 respondents clove farmers” is enough. Our response: Thank you very much for raising this comment. You might be right. The research sample was relatively small compared to others. On the other side, statistically, the minimum sample size for the research was 137 respondents (140 for rounding) using the Slovin formula, as written in the section of the research method, as presented below. For your information, as we said before, this study was self-financing, so we could enlarge the sample size due to budget limitations.

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Many, many thanks for the feedback you provided. Yes, you are right.

1) The word “from” is unnecessary in the sentence. We made a mistake in the first submission by choosing the wrong file. Anyway, the sentence has been improved as presented below:

2) Again, you are correct. We found inconsistency in writing the symbols. We have already improved them, as presented below:

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POINT-BY-POINT RESPONSES TO THE COMMENTS/SUGGESTIONS

REVIEWER#2

A. The REVIEWER#2’S COMMENTS/ SUGGESTIONS

RESPONSES

Position in the pdf Manuscripts*

A GRATITUDE EXPRESSION

We are grateful for your important suggestions for our manuscript. Your feedback is invaluable, and it has helped us enhance the quality and clarity of the article. Your comments have provided insightful and valuable viewpoints, enhancing this work and providing key insights for future research development. We have comprehensively examined the research article and applied considerable revisions to the manuscript under the comments/suggestions offered by REVIEWER#2

#1. Designation of the abbreviations (for example, EE, EM, OR, B, PM and others) should be used only once when they firstly appear (e.g., lines 862, 9868 and 899, 865 and 882 and others). Respected authors are encouraged to tidy up the use of abbreviations, especially in Abstracts and Conclusions.

§  Thanks a lot for your recommendation. Yes. Executed. We have already deleted the unnecessary abbreviations. Please recheck them. We present below as an example.

§  We have already tidied up the abbreviations in the conclusion (see the example below). While no abbreviation in the abstract from the beginning.

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#2. Conclusions are poorly structured. The dear authors are recommended to emphasize the main results more clearly.

Thank you very much for your recommendation. Yes. Done. We have already reconstructed the sentence structure of the conclusion. Please recheck it. Below is an example of the new sentences.

Please go to Page 25.

#3.  It seems to me, there is no necessary to use Tables 3 and 6 for presenting the values of Chi-square, df and sig. These values can be just included into the body of the text.

Many, many thanks for the feedback you provided. Yes, we have already deleted Tables 3 and 6. Please recheck them.

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#4. In my opinion, novelty and relevance should be also highlighted in the Introduction. I dare to advice to the respected authors to show the special and particular importance of the results obtained by mathematical simulation of the local level for the sustainable development of the human global community.

Your suggestion is truly valued. For the introduction section's content, we follow this journal's guidance. It is said:

 “Introduction: The introduction should briefly place the study in a broad context and highlight why it is important. It should define the purpose of the work and its significance….” We believe the content of the introduction has already satisfied this guidance.

For the second comment, we do not exactly understand what you mean by this: “…to show the special and particular importance of the results obtained by mathematical simulation of the local level for the sustainable development of the human global community.” Could you please clarify if you would like us to provide a recommendation concerning the strategy for sustainable development? It is quite difficult for us to offer such a recommendation because it is beyond the scope of the study.

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POINT-BY-POINT RESPONSES TO THE COMMENTS/SUGGESTIONS

REVIEWER#3

A. The REVIEWER#3’S COMMENTS/ SUGGESTIONS

RESPONSES

Position in the pdf Manuscripts

APPRECIATIVE STATEMENT

REVIEWER#3: “Regarding the review process for manuscript sustainability-3463025, the manuscript presents valuable and original information on the factors influencing the effectiveness of agriculture extension in clove farming in Sidrap Regency. However, several key aspects need improvement:”

RESPONSES: Your helpful comments in reviewing the manuscript are greatly appreciated. Your insightful comments have helped us polish the piece and make it easier to understand. Your comments have improved this study and provided essential recommendations for future research by offering informed and practical opinions.

#1. Introduction: The introduction should be strengthened, particularly by providing theoretical support for the terms used in title and the subsequent sections.

Your suggestion is truly valued. For the introduction section's content, we follow this journal's guidance. It is said:

 “Introduction: The introduction should briefly place the study in a broad context and highlight why it is important. It should define the purpose of the work and its significance….” We believe the content of the introduction has already satisfied this guidance. For example, the purpose of the study was clearly defined, as shown below:

Please go to Page 4.

#2. Methodology: There is obviated information regarding some of the methods used in the data analysis.

Thanks a lot for your comment. We have a problem identifying the information that was obviated in the research method section. It was not specified. We tried to guess it, which led us to add information regarding the pretest questionnaire, as shown below:

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#3. Results: There is redundant information within this section. It would benefit from a more concise summary of the main findings.

Thanks a lot for your comment. Unfortunately, we cannot recognize the redundancy you are referring to. For the sake of making it easier for us to detect, it ought to be specified. We apologize for the inconvenience.

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#4. Discussion: Discussion may be enriched using specific results (tendencies or answers) obtained from the interviews. Please add this information and include it in the discussion section.

Your comment is truly valued and appreciated.  It is one of the approaches that, in our opinion, enriches the discussion of the research results.  However, there is a problem with getting this done.  First, we have no precise data concerning farmers' viewpoints with a specific variable.  For the second reason, we need to return to the field to do qualitative research, which is a different study design if we want to use the farmers' responses to deepen the conversation.  This work does not use your proposal; rather, it uses the results of earlier research to discuss our findings.

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Specific comments can be found in the attached file.

#1. PAGE-1

We appreciate your comment on this point. Regarding the keywords, we follow the author guide for the journal as follows:

“Keywords: Three to ten pertinent keywords need to be added after the abstract. We recommend that the keywords are specific to the article, yet reasonably common within the subject discipline.” We think the five keywords satisfied this criterion.

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#2. PAGE-2

Thanks for your suggestion. It has been improved by adding “economic value,” as shown below:

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#3. PAGE-2

Thanks for your suggestion. We have improved the sentence, as shown below:

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#4. PAGE-3

Thanks for your direction. We have improved the sentence, as shown below:

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#5. PAGE-4

Thanks a lot for your comment. We have no specific meaning of the words “production and productivity” in this paper. These words mean as in everyday language. Then, the word “effectiveness” was explained in the last paragraph of the introduction section, as shown below.

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#6. PAGE-4

Your comment is very much appreciated. We did not use any specific criteria when developing the literature review. Agricultural extension, the socio-economics of agriculture, and clove farming are all topics in the literature that we have just gathered, read, and reviewed to construct.

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#7. PAGE-4

Thanks a lot for your comment at this point. We just deleted the sentence, as shown below:

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#8. PAGE-7

Thanks for showing us this missing reference. We have already added reference No. 91, as shown below:

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#9. PAGE-9

Your suggestion on this point is very appreciated. In this paper, the terms “production” and “productivity” are in everyday language in meaning—no specific meaning for them.

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#10. PAGE-10

Thanks a lot for your question. We have no specific criteria to define the variables. We made the conclusion based on the preceding literature review.

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#11. PAGE-10

Your sharing of knowledge is very appreciated. We have already improved it, as shown below:

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#12. PAGE-12

Thanks a lot for your suggestion. We have a sub-section of measurement units. Please refer to Table 1 for the definition of EE, as shown below:

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#13. PAGE-13

Thanks a lot for your suggestion. We already define the EE in Table 1, as shown below:

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#14. PAGE-17

Your suggestion is very appreciated. We think it is one of the methods that enriches the discussion of the research results. But we have a problem in doing this. Firstly, we have no accurate data on the farmers' perspective related to a particular variable. Secondly, we think we must go back to the field to do qualitative research, another research design if we want to use the farmers’ answers to enrich the discussion. Instead of your suggestion, in this paper, we used previous research results to discuss our findings.

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#15. PAGE-17

Thank you very much for your suggestion. We have already added a new sub-sub-section (Nagelkerke R-Square Test) in the research method section, as shown below:

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#15. PAGE-19

Thank you very much for reminding us of the error statement. We have already improved it, as shown below:

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#16. PAGE-19

Thanks a lot for your suggestion. As shown below, we have already added a subsection related to the Hosmer and Lemeshow Test in the research method section.

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#18. PAGE-19

Your suggestion is very appreciated. We have already improved the sentence, as shown below:

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#19. PAGE-20

Thank you very much for your suggestion. We have already improved the Figure 5 caption, as shown below:

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#20. PAGE-23

Thanks a lot for your comment on this point. We have no particular criteria for grouping the variables except for their similarity in characteristics.

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