Temporal and Spatial Response of Ecological Environmental Quality to Land Use Transfer in Nanling Mountain Region, China Based on RSEI: A Case Study of Longnan City

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I have carefully reviewed the manuscript titled ” Temporal and spatial response of ecological environment quality to land use transfer in Nanling Mountain region, China based on RSEI”. Overall, the manuscript is interesting, but it requires further improvement.

 

First, the title should be more accurate. The focus is on Longnan City (not Nanling mountain), which, although part of the Nanling Mountains region, is actually a lowland area with an elevation under 1400m. I suggest adjusting the title to reflect this specific area.

 

The introduction needs significant improvement. The novelty of this work is unclear, It's not clear what makes this study new or different from previous ones.

There are multiple statements in the introduction section without references. Please review this section and add the necessary citations.

For example: 

Line 39-40: All parts of the country responded positively, and the ecological environment quality in most areas has improved significantly.

Line 44-45: agricultural land and ecological land are squeezed, resulting in the gradual deterioration of ecological environment quality.

Line 45-47: On the other hand, the land transfer caused by the implementation of measures such as returning farmland to forest (lake) will improve the quality of the local ecological environment.

Please double-check your references and adhere to the journal's guidelines. There are a few errors, such as incorrect author names and missing information

For example line 64 Zhang è Zhange et al.,   Yuan è Yuan et al.,        Zhangè Zhange et al.,

Line 67:  Pai Rihai · Heili  è  Helili and Mei,   Xu è Xu et al.,

 

Please add a flowchart to the methodology section in order to help reader understand your approach more clearly.

 

The main goal of this study is to study how ecological environment quality responses to land use transfer. However,I'm concerned about the reliability of your land use data for 2018 and 2013, which was visually interpreted by the authors. Could you provide more details on how you ensured the accuracy of this data?

 

What classification system did you use for land use classification?What does traffic land means?

 

Grammar and English need to be checked again.

For example, Line 72-74. The sentence is unclear

But its artificial forest species is single, forest quality is not good, urban construction and mining development lead to biodiversity damage, ecological environment quality deterioration.

 

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Grammar and English need to be checked again.

For example, Line 72-74. The sentence is unclear

But its artificial forest species is single, forest quality is not good, urban construction and mining development lead to biodiversity damage, ecological environment quality deterioration.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for your valuable suggestions, we have revised them one by one, as described below:

The introduction has been supplemented with relevant research background and relevant references. The novelty of our research work and the difference from previous studies have also been emphasized.

We have ensured that all references cited are relevant to the research. The introduction section has added the necessary references, such as Line 39-40, Line 44-45, and Line 45-47 of the original manuscript.

References have been carefully checked to correct incorrect author names and supplemented missing information.

The title has been changed to “Temporal and spatial response of ecological environment qual-ity to land use transfer in Nanling Mountain region, China based on RSEI：A case study of Longnan City”.

A flowchart has been added to the methodology section in order to help reader understand your approach more clearly.

We have provided more details on how we ensured the accuracy of this data in Data section. It has been supplemented with an introduction to land use classification using a separate classification system, and an explanation of the meaning of land for transportation in Data section.

Grammar and English have been checked again and ambiguous statements have been modified, Such as Line 72-74 in the original manuscript.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. Overall, this paper only makes an empirical analysis of Nanling Mountain region by applying existing methods. It makes little contribution to knowledge gap in terms of research perspective, research methods, research conclusions, etc., and is obviously insufficient in research characteristics and innovation.

2. Why did the authors choose this region as the research object? What are its characteristics？ What reference value does it have to other regions?

3. This paper lacks a detailed description of the processing process of remote sensing data.

4. The Discussion section is not only short in text, but also not in-depth and has limited academic value.

5. Among the references, there are too many literatures written by Chinese people, which do not meet the requirements of international journals.

6. In Table 4, cultivated land includes crop land. What is the author's purpose in making this distinction?

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for your valuable suggestions, we have revised them one by one, as described below:

1. Overall, this paper only makes an empirical analysis of Nanling Mountain region by applying existing methods. It makes little contribution to knowledge gap in terms of research perspective, research methods, research conclusions, etc., and is obviously insufficient in research characteristics and innovation.

Authors’ response:

The uniqueness of the study area has been supplemented. And the research methods, results, discussion and conclusion sections have all been improved to ensure our innovation.

2. Why did the authors choose this region as the research object? What are its characteristics？ What reference value does it have to other regions?

Authors’ response:

The characteristics of the study area have been supplemented.

3. This paper lacks a detailed description of the processing process of remote sensing data.

Authors’ response:

A detailed description of the remote sensing data processing process has been added.

4. The Discussion section is not only short in text, but also not in-depth and has limited academic value.

Authors’ response:

The discussion has been carried out in detail and depth, and the comparison with similar studies has been increased, and the academic value has been improved.

5. Among the references, there are too many literatures written by Chinese people, which do not meet the requirements of international journals.

Authors’ response:

The proportion of references written by Chinese has been reduced. Most of the literature comes from international journals.

6. In Table 4, cultivated land includes crop land. What is the author's purpose in making this distinction?

Authors’ response:

Crop land has been modified into gardern land. The description of land class has been added in Table 2, and the explanation of the distinction between cultivated land and gardern land is given.

 

In addition, we have also made changes in the following aspects:

1.The introduction has been supplemented with relevant research background and relevant references. The novelty of our research work and the difference from previous studies have also been emphasized.

2.We have ensured that all references cited are relevant to the research. The introduction section has added the necessary references, such as Line 39-40, Line 44-45, and Line 45-47 of the original manuscript.

3.The presentation of relevant research results has been strengthened in the manuscript.

4.All of the conclusions are supported by the results after modification.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

I have read the entitled manuscript "Temporal and spatial response of ecological environment qual-2 ity to land use transfer in Nanling Mountain region, China 3 based on RSEI" submitted to Land.

These are some comments and suggestions for your manuscript,

1) LUCC is mentioned in the abstract and then in pages: 15 and 18. However, it was not defined in the text. I understand that meaning, however it must be described since the first time.

2) Line 67: there is a typo or missed reference (Pai Rihai · Heili [26] and Xu[27])

3) Line 109: ...."by Geospatial data Cloud and Alibaba Cloud AI Earth platform". Could you please provide additional information about those platforms and a link? That would be quite useful for user not familiar with.

4) Table 4: ....there is a typo in the title (Ciyt).

5) Figure 1: Please specify the units of the scale.

Author Response

1、LUCC is mentioned in the abstract and then in pages: 15 and 18. However, it was not defined in the text. I understand that meaning, however it must be described since the first time.

Authors’ response:

The definition of LUCC at its first appearance (Abstract section) has been supplemented.

2. Line 67: there is a typo or missed reference (Pai Rihai · Heili [26] and Xu[27])

Authors’ response:

The irregular reference in line 67 of the manuscript has been revised.

3. Line 109: ...."by Geospatial data Cloud and Alibaba Cloud AI Earth platform". Could you please provide additional information about those platforms and a link? That would be quite useful for user not familiar with.

Authors’ response:

Detailed information and links to the Geospatial Data Cloud and Alibaba Cloud AI Earth Platform have been added.

 

4. Table 4: ....there is a typo in the title (Ciyt).

Authors’ response:

The misword (Ciyt) in the title of Table 4 has been modified to City.

5. Figure 1: Please specify the units of the scale.

Authors’ response:

The scale unit refers specifically to Longnan City in Figure 1.

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors has addressed my comments.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for reviewing our revised draft and affirming our revision work. In order to further improve the quality of our manuscript, we have made further improvements on the basis of the revised manuscript, including the introduction, technical flow chart, results, discussion and References. The novelty of our research work and the difference from previous studies have also been emphasized. The content of the second modification is marked in green.

Thanks again.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

After being revised, this paper has improved in quality to some extent. However, the following issues need to be further revised:

1. The text in the Results section is too long, while the text in the Discussion section is too short. It is suggested to expand the in-depth discussion from a broader perspective and optimize the structure of the paper.

2. It is necessary to further summarize and distill the innovations of the paper from the perspectives of research scope, research methods, and research results.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer:

Thank you for reviewing our revised draft and affirming our revision work. In order to further improve the quality of our manuscript, we have made further improvements in accordance with your comments,on the basis of the revised manuscript as described below:

1. The text in the Results section is too long, while the text in the Discussion section is too short. It is suggested to expand the in-depth discussion from a broader perspective and optimize the structure of the paper.

Authors’ response:

We have expanded the in-depth discussion from a broader perspective and increased the length of the discussion section.

2. It is necessary to further summarize and distill the innovations of the paper from the perspectives of research scope, research methods, and research results.

Authors’ response:

We have further summarized and distilled the innovations of the paper from the perspectives of research scope, research methods, and research results. The novelty of our research work and the difference from previous studies have also been emphasized in introduction section and discussion section.

In addition, we have also made changes in the following aspects:

1.The introduction has been supplemented with relevant research background and relevant references [55-60].

2.We have ensured that all references cited are relevant to the research.

3. The method flow chart has been further improved.

The content of the second modification is marked in green.

Thanks again.