Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Services Sustainability Improvement in the Karst Desertification Control

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

I reviewed this paper "Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape 2 Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Service Sustainability 3 Improvement in the Karst Rocky Desertification Control" The objective of this review paper is to summarize 15 the research progress on agroforestry ecosystem quality and landscape pattern (ELA), reveal the 16 dynamic coupling mechanism between landscape pattern evolution and ecosystem quality, explore 17 the role of landscape pattern optimization in ecological processes and services in agroforestry, and 18 suggest future research and policy directions.

I have following suggestions for authors:

1:  First section of introduction can be improved by providing the analytical table of existing review paper and your review paper.

2:  quality of some figures is not high, especially 5,6.

3. Make extensive English revisions, and some of the sentence in section 2 are too long to understand. 

4.  Section 5 needs be improved to conclude the work comprehensively. 

5. Add some reference from 2022 research papers.

Author Response

Responses to the comments from Reviewer #1 (Relevant text changes made in blue in the revised manuscript)

Reviewer 1: I reviewed this paper "Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Service Sustainability Improvement in the Karst Rocky Desertification Control" The objective of this review paper is to summarize the research progress on agroforestry ecosystem quality and landscape pattern (ELA), reveal the dynamic coupling mechanism between landscape pattern evolution and ecosystem quality, explore the role of landscape pattern optimization in ecological processes and services in agroforestry, and suggest future research and policy directions.

I have following suggestions for authors:

 

Comment 1: First section of introduction can be improved by providing the analytical table of existing review paper and your review paper.

Response 1: Thank you for this comment. We have added a comparative analysis table of existing review papers and our review paper to the introduction section based on your suggestions (Table 1), and improved the overall logic of the preamble. The details are as follows: (Page 2, Lines 46-59)

“This is due to that landscape patterns, as carriers of agroforestry ecological processes, and their dynamics can directly influence the dispersion and provision of ecosystem services [10-12] and determine various ecological processes [13]. Within the current published publications, studies have been reported reviewing agroforestry ecosystems, such as environmental benefits [14], summary of ecosystem services [15], structural and functional stability [16], and the influence of generative elements of ecosystem services on supply capacity [17]. These studies all focus on agroforestry, focusing on its scientific understanding and management measures in terms of improving ecosystem service capacity from different perspectives (Table 1). However, few studies have reviewed how the landscape level influences and enhances the capacity of agroforestry ecosystem service provisioning based on a landscape perspective.”

Table 1. Comparison of existing review papers with this paper

Year	Journal	Title	Keywords	Focus Point
2017	Water Resour Manage	Environmental Benefits and Control of Pollution to Surface Water and Groundwater by Agroforestry Systems: a Review [14].	Agroforestry systems, Alley cropping, Fertilizers, Pesticides, Control ofleachingto groundwater, Control of surface runoff pollution	Environmental benefits.
2018	Animal Production Science	Agroforestry for ruminants: A review of trees and shrubs as fodder in silvopastoral temperate and tropical production systems [15].	Agroforestry; Biodiversity; Ecosystem services; Landscape ecology; Pest regulation; Pollination	Summary of Ecosystem Services.
2022	Forests	Structure and Stability of Agroforestry Ecosystems: Insights into the Improvement of Service Supply Capacity of Agroforestry Ecosystems under the Karst Rocky Desertification Control [16].	Agroforestry; Ecosystem; Structure; Stability; Progress; Insights; Rocky desertification control	Structural and functional stability.
2022	Science of the Total Environment	A review of agroforestry ecosystem services and its enlightenment on the ecosystem improvement of rocky desertification control [17]	Agroforestry; Generating elements; Service management; Supply capacity; Gaps	The influence of service generating factors on supply capacity.

 

Comment 2: quality of some figures is not high, especially 5,6.

Response 2: Thank you, we totally agree with it. We have refined the content of the figures and improved the quality of the figures according to the textual expressions corresponding to figures 5 and 6. Also, we have optimized the corresponding text part. The details are as follows: (Page 10, Lines 329-345)

“The global perspective reveals that research on ELA is unevenly developed and has prominent regional characteristics. Figure 6 shows the global distribution of ELA-related research regions and research institutions, respectively. In terms of the regional distribution of studies, the United States, China, Germany, Italy and other north temperate countries are the main concentrations of ELA studies, with the number of literature exceeding 12. However, ELA research in the tropics, where agroforestry (cocoa and coffee) is better developed, is not as hot as in temperate regions [70,71]. The reasons for this phenomenon are influenced not only by natural conditions and socioeconomic differences, but also national policy support and the attention of research institutions play an important role in it [72]. From Figure 6, it can be found that the highest spatial distribution density of research institutions is located in developed countries, which reflects the higher attention to agroforestry ecosystems and policy development [17,21].”

 

Figure 5. Research hotspots annual issue volume changes (From 1983 to June 30, 2022).

 

Figure 6. Regional distribution of global literature research and major institutions. The color bands and numbers in the legend indicate the number of publications; the darker the color, the higher the number of articles issued.

 

Comment 3: Make extensive English revisions, and some of the sentence in section 2 are too long to understand.

Response 3: Thank you for this comment, we totally agree with it. In the second part (Methods), we simplified and revised some long sentences, and commissioned a professional organization to touch up the manuscript in its entirety. In addition, we have fully improved the explanation of Methods. The details are as follows: (Pages 4-7, Lines 148-245)

 

 

Comment 4: Section 5 needs be improved to conclude the work comprehensively.

Response 4: Thank you for this comment. We have reviewed the manuscript to fully summarize and refine the conclusion section based on your suggestions. The details are as follows: (Page 22, Lines 865-914)

“In this paper, a literature search of ELA-related studies was conducted through the Scopus core database, and the 163 obtained papers were systematically analyzed and reviewed. The main conclusions were as follows: (1) there was an overall upward trend in the annual number of publications on ELA, which underwent a transition from a nascent to a rapidly growing period, leading to an improved understanding of agroforestry landscape patterns and ecological processes. (2) In terms of research branches, ecosystem quality research accounts for the major part (36%), landscape pattern (26%) and benefit coupling mechanism (23%) research has been developed synergistically, and landscape optimization practice (9%) lags relatively behind other branches, which highlights the failure of synergy between practice and theory. (3) Current progress and landmark results focus on topics such as cropping patterns, community structure, habitat variation, driver analysis, index response, and method optimization. The focus needs to be on clarifying the interactions of ELA and how they affect and enhance the capacity of agroforestry ecosystem service provisioning. (4) Future research related to agroforestry ecosystems needs to go beyond the field scale, and exploring the sustainability of agroforestry ecosystem benefits based on the landscape scale or a larger spatial scale has become key to addressing the risks. In the research process,, it is necessary to combine spatial and temporal scales, cooperate across disciplines and pay attention to regional habitat specificities, clarify the key drivers of agroforestry landscape patterns and ecological processes in different regional types, and help improve landscape pattern optimization strategies to guide practice. (5) The practice of optimizing agroforestry landscapes in karst areas needs to face the challenges of spatial and temporal dynamics of ecosystems, pay attention to possible future contingencies (e.g., the challenges of climate change) and the specificity of rocky desertification habitats, and integrate biological and engineering measures for scientific planning as an effective way to maintain sustainable agroforestry ecosystem services.

Another important point is that the mindset of karst ecological management needs to change from "prevention" to "coexistence", respecting the natural base characteristics of karst's "binary three-dimensional" hydrological structure. The main factor of ecological damage in karst areas is the human-land conflict, i.e. the relationship between human and nature has not been improved. However, with the decoupling of human-land relations due to the massive labor exodus in recent years, we should seize this opportunity to vigorously develop agroforestry and promote the optimization of landscape structure, so as to expand the ecological benefits of mixed agroforestry. Make the optimized agroforestry as a smarter governance measure, taking advantage of its attributes to see rocky outcrops as friends, and change the governance mindset from defensive to receptive. This requires policy guidance that recognizes the environmental benefits provided by agroforestry ecosystems and encourages widespread implementation of optimization measures. However, individual farmers have limited land and can only be developed and optimized at the farm scale. Therefore, this calls for promotion by policy makers with a higher strategic perspective and learning from developed countries that have advocacy, research, and integration as strategic goals and set specific tasks for the various agencies of the Ministry of Agriculture in the development of agroforestry. Meanwhile, future ELA research work should be based on the relationship between humans and nature and economic and ecological needs and also be based on the actual situation of geographical habitats in the KRD region. Combined with the main progress and key scientific questions we summarized, this information can be used to inspire policy optimization of decision makers and land management of landowners and to further promote the supply enhancement of agroforestry ecosystem services.”

 

Comment 5: Add some reference from 2022 research papers.

Response 5: Thank you. Based on your suggestions, we have optimized the article citations and added some research papers for 2022. The details are as follows:

“Azamat A, Zbynek P, Dietrich D, Maksim K, Vladimir V, Roy CS (2022) Classification of Mountain Silvopastoral Farming Systems in Walnut Forests of Kyrgyzstan: Determining Opportunities for Sustainable Livelihoods. Agriculture, 12(12), 2004 doi:10.3390/agriculture12122004

Tang X, Xiao J, Ma M, Yang H, Li X, Ding Z, Yu P, Zhang Y, Wu C, Huang J (2022) Satellite evidence for china's leading role in restoring vegetation productivity over global karst ecosystems. Forest Ecology and Management, 507, 120000.

Matthew MS, Gary B, Todd K, Katherine MF, Richard S, Lord A (2022) Agroforestry Extent in the United States: A Review of National Datasets and Inventory Efforts. Agriculture 2022, 12(5), 726 doi:10.3390/agriculture12050726

Rachmat M, Tam TL, Nghia DT, Elisabeth S (2022) Policy Support for Home Gardens in Vietnam Can Link to Sustainable Development Goals. Agriculture 2022, 12(2), 253 doi:10.3390/agriculture12020253

Ilias K, Thomas GP, Dimitrios F (2022) Abandonment of Silvopastoral Practices Affects the Use of Habitats by the European Hare (Lepus europaeus). Agriculture 2022, 12(5), 678 doi:10.3390/agriculture12050678”

 

Responses to the comments from Reviewer #2 (Relevant text changes made in blue in the revised manuscript)

Reviewer 2: The review entitled "Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Service Sustainability Improvement in the Karst Rocky Desertification Control" is very comprehensive, with potential frame work, and design.

My only suggestion to the author is as follows:

 

Comment 1: The only thing I suggest is to modify Abstract by incorporating the brief methodology.

回应1：感谢您的评论，我们完全同意您的意见。我们对摘要进行了更改，以根据您的建议纳入方法。详情如下：（第1页，第15-21行)

“通过Scopus数据库，使用检索、评估和综合报告的文献综述方法，共获得了16 3份与农林业生态系统质量和景观模式（ELA）相关的出版物，符合一套纳入标准。 总结ELA研究进展，揭示景观格局演化与生态系统质量的动态耦合机制，探讨景观格局优化在农林业生态过程和服务中的作用，并提出未来的研究和政策方向。

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The review entitled "Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Service Sustainability Improvement in the Karst Rocky Desertification Control" is very comprehensive, with potential frame work, and design. The only thing I suggest is to modify Abstract by incorporating the brief methodology.

Author Response

Responses to the comments from Reviewer #2 (Relevant text changes made in blue in the revised manuscript)

Reviewer 2: The review entitled "Revelation of Coupled Ecosystem Quality and Landscape Patterns for Agroforestry Ecosystem Service Sustainability Improvement in the Karst Rocky Desertification Control" is very comprehensive, with potential frame work, and design.

My only suggestion to the author is as follows:

 

Comment 1: The only thing I suggest is to modify Abstract by incorporating the brief methodology.

回应1：感谢您的评论，我们完全同意您的意见。我们对摘要进行了更改，以根据您的建议纳入方法。详情如下：（第1页，第15-21行)

“通过Scopus数据库，使用检索、评估和综合报告的文献综述方法，共获得了16 3份与农林业生态系统质量和景观模式（ELA）相关的出版物，符合一套纳入标准。 总结ELA研究进展，揭示景观格局演化与生态系统质量的动态耦合机制，探讨景观格局优化在农林业生态过程和服务中的作用，并提出未来的研究和政策方向。

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Based on the literature analysis of the dynamic coupling mechanism between landscape pattern evolution and ecosystem quality, this paper discusses the role of landscape pattern optimization in the ecological process and services in agroforestry ecosystem, and looks forward to the future research and policy direction.It has certain innovation. 

The specific modification suggestions are as follows:

1.The review framework is not clear enough, that is to say, the logic is not strong enough.

2.The large length of the manuscript introduces the ELA, while the study in the KRD region is small, thus potentially requiring appropriate revision of the title.

3.In this paper, the review of the literature is not enough. It should not be the list of materials, but should include further discussion of the issues.

4.The explanation of the research method is not enough.

5.In the third part, the paper analyzed the gaps and limitations of ecosystem-related research in different periods based on social, economic and cultural differences, but there is a lack of discussion and analysis based on cultural differences.

6.In the 4.1.3 part, it is not clear enough to elaborate the research progress and milestone results of the interest coupling mechanism, and the research results of the coupling mechanism are not systematically summarized and refined.

7.The overall context of the paper is not very clear, it seems to be a mishmash of information and it is difficult to draw a clear conclusion from the manuscript.

8.The conclusion part is less, appropriately increase your own views and discussions.

9.The authors should introduce the direction and impact of ELA on policy.

Author Response

Responses to the comments from Reviewer #3 (Relevant text changes made in blue in the revised manuscript)

Reviewer 3: Based on the literature analysis of the dynamic coupling mechanism between landscape pattern evolution and ecosystem quality, this paper discusses the role of landscape pattern optimization in the ecological process and services in agroforestry ecosystem, and looks forward to the future research and policy direction.It has certain innovation.

The specific modification suggestions are as follows:

 

Comment 1: The review framework is not clear enough, that is to say, the logic is not strong enough.

Response 1: Thank you for this comment. We fully agree with your comments and have optimized the framework of the review based on your comments. We explain in detail the framework of the systematic literature review in the methods section, adding sections to make the structure of our review clearer and more intuitive. The details are as follows: (Pages 4-5, Lines 149-184; Pages 6-7, Lines 225-245).

In addition, we have corresponded the contents of the protocol of chapter 2.1 with the full text, they are:

1. Protocol question 1 corresponds to section "1. Annual Distribution and Research contents of Literature".
2. Protocol question 2 corresponds to section "2. Research region and institution distribution".
3. protocol question 3 corresponds to section "1. Research progress and landmark results".
4. protocol question 4 corresponds to section "2. Key scientific questions".
5. protocol question 5 corresponds to section "3. Revelation on enhancing the sustainability of agroforestry benefits in KRD control areas".

 

Comment 2: The large length of the manuscript introduces the ELA, while the study in the KRD region is small, thus potentially requiring appropriate revision of the title.

Response 2: Thank you for this comment. We attach great importance to your opinion and organized all authors to discuss this issue. In this manuscript, we have a revelation chapter that aims to enlighten the development of agroforestry in the KRD region through a review of the global literature. Therefore, although the study length of the KRD region is smaller than that of the ELA, it occupies an important position in the goals of our study.

At the same time, we also found that the reason for such doubts is that we did not explain clearly the agroforestry background in the KRD area in the preface. Therefore, we have optimized the logical relationship and significantly revised the third paragraph of the Preface. The details are as follows: (Pages 3-4, Lines 99-128)

“Especially in ecologically fragile areas represented by KRD, irrational human agricultural development activities crowding and destroying ecological space still exist, which not only cut the benefits of ecological restoration and protection [37], but also intensify the trade-off between ecological environmental protection and socioeconomic development [38]. This is always the focus of much attention globally [39]. The problem of land degradation is not only a typical case of karst ecologically fragile areas, but also a key concern for agriculture, ecology and environment in the region [40]. In recent years, in karst areas with severe environmental degradation, governments at all levels have been restoring KRD and improving people's well-being through ongoing governance projects [41]. Among them, the KRD comprehensive control project carried out by the Chinese government at the end of the 20th century has resulted in an overall trend of "continuous net reduction" in environmental degradation, securing a large amount of natural capital and assets for human beings, strengthening the material foundation for human survival and development, and promoting regional ecological recovery and socioeconomic development [41-43]. Due to its significant benefits in improving land productivity, preventing soil erosion, and providing livelihood needs, agroforestry is regarded as the preferred multifunctional land use method in ecologically fragile areas [44]. After years of verification, the agroforestry ecosystem not only maximizes the ecological benefits of soil and water conservation and land productivity [45,46], but also serves to protect biodiversity and other functions [47,48]. Thus, large areas of agroforestry ecological landscapes have also been formed for the purpose of ecological treatment. However, the unique hydrogeological structure and ecosystems of the KRD region are characterized by complexity and vulnerability compared to other agroforestry cultivation areas (Figure 1), and the risk of degradation of already fragile ecosystems is exacerbated by irrational human activities. In addition, many studies have shown that the agroforestry ecosystem services after KRD treatment have lagging supply capacity and continuous quality fluctuations, which limit the harmonious development of human-land relationship [17,18,49]. Under the new situation, how to improve the sustainability of agroforestry benefits and the level of regional ecosystem services in KRD control is imminent.”

 

Comment 3: In this paper, the review of the literature is not enough. It should not be the list of materials, but should include further discussion of the issues.

Response 3: Thank you for your comments, we have realized this serious problem. Based on your suggestions, we have made several revisions to the full text, mainly distributed in 1. Introduction, 3.2 Regional Distribution, 4.1.3 Benefit Coupling Mechanism and 4.3 Revelation to supplement our own views, and to issue for further discussion. The details are as follows: (Page 2, Lines 46-66; Page 10, Lines 329-341; Page 15, Lines 582-595; Page 21, Lines 822-830)

 

Comment 4: The explanation of the research method is not enough.

Response 4: Thank you for this comment, we totally agree with your opinion. We have consulted a large number of sources, introduced the research methods section in detail, and adjusted the layout to make it more logical. In addition, we have added a section "2.4 Synthesis Report" to complete the methodology section. The details are as follows: (Pages 4-7, Lines 149-245)

“2. Methods

This study is based on a structured literature review of ELA-related research. The goal is to collect a large number of peer-reviewed scientific publications around the world, from which to identify and catalogue the knowledge field and provide inspiration for the current agroforestry development in the KRD region. To facilitate scientific quantitative evaluation, we used a systematic literature review framework to trace existing work based on the scientific information provided by the Scopus database [17,57]. The specific framework is as follows:

• Protocol: Define the scope and purpose of this study;
• Search: Development of search strategies, identification of search strings and selection of search databases;
• Appraisal: To evaluate the quality of retrieved documents and define the quality standards for inclusion and exclusion of documents;
• Synthesis Report: Extract data, quantitatively classify and describe the results, summarize the main progress and landmark achievements, determine the key scientific issues to be solved, and give inspiration in combination with practical problems.

The method is systematically logical and has four major advantages: transparency, independence, robustness, and comprehensiveness [58]. Its scientific validity has been confirmed by its use in various research fields [59]. Therefore, we conducted a retrospective study with this method, focusing on the four steps of retrieval identification, repeat screening, eligibility and inclusion [60].

2.1. Protocol

To ensure the transparency, transferability, and replicability characteristics of the literature system review effort, a protocol was developed prior to conducting the search. The most central element of the protocol definition is the identification of the review's purpose, which helps to formulate answerable research questions and define research boundaries. The main research questions were as follows:

• What are the trends in the number of publications over the years, the types of research topics that can be classified, and the number of each topic?
• Global ELA research focus regions and their institutional distribution?
• Current major research progress and landmark results?
• What are the key scientific questions that need to be addressed in future research?
• What are the implications of this study in terms of enhancing the sustainability of agroforestry benefits in the KRD region?

All of the above are questions that this study answers by adopting a systematic literature review framework.”

“2.3. Literature selection criteria

Using a bibliometric approach [56], the 845 papers obtained by the search engine were reviewed for research content by strictly following the procedure developed in Figure 2. In addition, inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied additionally to the initial search results, and papers that met the inclusion criteria were selected for further review and content assessment [61]. The specific method is based on the following criteria for screening:

• First, all literature was screened for duplicate items and 689 relevant papers were obtained.
• Second, the literature was examined according to its title, abstract and keywords, and those with low relevance to the research topic were eliminated. For example,although the title "Landscape composition is more important than local vegetation structure for understory birds in cocoa agroforestry systems" mentions key terms such as agroforestry ecosystems and landscape composition, the abstract states that the focus of the study is on the role of birds and therefore needs to be excluded.
• Third, the literature retained from the secondary screening was read in its entirety, and the screening was based on covering at least one ELA-related study for eligibility determination. For example, a full reading of "Conserving Biodiversity Through Certification of Tropical Agroforestry Crops at Local and Landscape Scales" reveals that the study focuses on the certification experience of tropical agroforestry crops coffee and cocoa and proposes certification at the landscape scale. Therefore, it needs to be eliminated.
• Ultimately, 163 articles that were highly relevant to the research topic after three rounds of screening were included in the process to form the final sample for this study.”

“2.4. Synthesis Report

In this phase, the 163 scientific publications that were eventually included were read intensively and then relevant variables of interest were extracted and classified in order to draw knowledge and conclusions. With a large increase in population, the supply of agroforestry ecosystem services is increasingly constrained [17]. However, current research on agroforestry ecosystems still mainly uses geographic, botanical and ecological perspectives to explore the importance of services and classifications, etc. This tends to overlook the importance of the spatial dimension of the landscape and the supply capacity enhancement [18,49]. Therefore, we believe that summarizing knowledge and conclusions around the above literature, identifying impacts of landscape elements and external interventions are necessary to mitigate the current situation of limited supply for agroforestry ecosystem services.

According to ELA-related research, we had divided four main research interests, namely, ecosystem quality, landscape pattern, coupling benefit mechanism and landscape optimization design. First, in Chapter 3.1 of Results and Analysis, conduct a quantitative analysis of the annual distribution and content of the retrieval results; Second, in Section 3.2, we identify the global distribution of study areas and their research institutions; Thirdly, in chapters 4.1 and 4.2 of Retrospect and prospect, the research progress and landmark achievements were summarized, as well as key scientific issues were discussed; Ultimately, insights into the benefit enhancement of agroforestry ecosystems in the KRD region were provided in Section 4.3.”

 

Comment 5: In the third part, the paper analyzed the gaps and limitations of ecosystem-related research in different periods based on social, economic and cultural differences, but there is a lack of discussion and analysis based on cultural differences.

Response 5: Thank you for this comment, we totally agree with your opinion. In this study, we mainly explored differences based on natural economic and social conditions, and did not pay attention tor cultural influences. Because the writing is not rigorous enough, there are logical loopholes in the article. We will pay attention to the rigor of writing in our future work, and dig deep into cultural differences to make up for the influence of cultural factors. At the same time, we reviewed the content in this section and made improvements to its content. Our addition to this passage is as follows: (Page 7, Lines 251-253; Page 10, Lines 346-352; Page 11, Lines 369-378)

“the results highlight the gaps and limitations of ELA-related research over the years, and analyze this phenomenon based on the differences between natural economic and social conditions.”

“The United States, for example, as the world's largest agricultural exporter of agricultural products with a fixed international sales market and a highly mechanized agroforestry industry, provides a sufficient research base for ELA research to some extent [5,73]. This makes the vast majority of doctoral dissertations on agroforestry complex management come from U.S. universities, where optimal land resource use and design is one of the main research components [74]. Additionally, policy support as an important driving factor is an essential link.”

“However, agroforestry complex management, as a traditional Chinese characteristic agriculture, is exactly a sustainable agricultural model that meets the current development needs. There had already been a theoretical summary of its agricultural culture in the course of long-term practice, emphasizing the correct handling of the relationship between organisms and the environment, and between organisms and organisms [16]. It contains the biological planar layout of the agroforestry complex management model, which can be divided into various forms such as banded interspecies, cluster mix, landscape layout, water-land interaction, and patch mosaic [74]”

 

Comment 6: In the 4.1.3 part, it is not clear enough to elaborate the research progress and milestone results of the interest coupling mechanism, and the research results of the coupling mechanism are not systematically summarized and refined.

Response 6: Thank you, we totally agree with your opinion. Based on your suggestions, we have modified the research progress and landmark achievements in Section 4.1.3, and systematically summarized and refined the research results. The details are as follows: (Pages 15-16, Lines 555-618)

“4.1.3. Benefit coupling mechanism

Agroforests, as human-dominated sustainable ecosystems, exhibit complex nonlinear interactions in structural and dynamic scale diversity and self-organizing capacity with changing landscape patterns [3,6,117], thereby providing their ecosystems with regulatory capacity [19,20]. Changes from simple to complex and from unstable to stable are in dynamic equilibrium [22]. Under external disturbances, landscape processes and ecological processes change, and the equilibrium point of agroforestry ecosystem quality fluctuates continuously. Once this fluctuation threshold is exceeded, the quality state inevitably develops to another stage [118]. Such changes, if contrary to the evolutionary direction of the ecosystem, will lead to the degradation of the ecosystem service supply capacity [10]. In response to the continuous fluctuations in the quality of agroforestry ecosystems, early ecological studies were at least implicitly concerned with the spatial distribution of organisms [119]. But the solutions were mainly based on the "restoration ecology" approach of removing disturbances and accelerating changes in biological components [120,121]. It was not until the 1990s that spatially explicit models gradually attracted attention that they began to combine research with traditional landscape ecology [122,123]. However, with the development of agroforestry ecosystems, the risks have exceeded expectations and have even led to increased deterioration [124]. The occurrence of this phenomenon, in addition to the inadequacy of current science, technology and methods, is also a realization that approaches to ecosystem conservation based on the integration of ecosystems at the landscape level have not received much attention [108].

After 2000, scholars gradually began to focus on multi-species interactions at the local spatial level, as well as self-organization and the formation of large-scale spatial patterns in biological distributions. She et al. (2004) and Corry (2019) point out, based on a landscape perspective, that agroforestry landscape patterns, while directly influencing landscape processes, also determine various ecological processes whose changes inevitably lead to changes in ecosystem quality and services [13,101,106]. For example, beetles are able to obtain subsistence food in patch A but lay eggs in patch B. Although natural enemies are ubiquitous within this landscape, ants in patch B can protect juvenile beetles from natural enemies. If such patch assemblages are disrupted, long-term development will lead to the extinction of beetles within the landscape and the disappearance of predators, which in turn will affect the disruption of the entire ecosystem cycle and even the breach of the quality threshold [125]. This will affects within-ecosystem energy, nutrient and hydrological cycles, pollutant distribution, and species transport within the ecosystem [11,12]. However, reconnecting them through inter-patch migration may restore stability to the entire spatial ecosystem [126]. Thus, different spatial combinations of patches have different functions, and the size, shape and connectivity of agroforestry patches affect the species richness, distribution, population viability and disturbance resistance within the landscape, which in turn improves the dispersal and provision of ecosystem services [106].

After the Second Agroforestry Conference, the potential role of agroforestry ecosystem services has attracted much attention, and whether agroforestry can sustainably play ecosystem services has become a question worth considering in the diversification stage [49]. From the perspective of landscape scale, the evolution of landscape patterns as a key factor for metacommunity structure and persistence in agroforestry landscapes [68], and changes in some indices can result in effective responses in biodiversity and abundance (including butterflies, beetles, birds and plants) [27]. Pin (2010), Liu et al. (2011), Ge et al. (2012) and Ma (2013) conducted ELA correlation analysis from different spatial and temporal scales, and the results showed that the evolution of landscape patterns is an important factor affecting the quality status of agroforestry ecosystems [78,127-129]. In addition, Zhang et al. (2010) and Chen et al. (2015) found that, to some extent, changes in landscape pattern indices could characterize changes in ecosystem quality [101,130]. For instance, areas with a large spatial extent of agroforestry landscape patterns, good connectivity, high edge density and low fragmentation can promote material exchange within the ecosystem and its own landscape, with which the corresponding ecosystem quality is higher [101,131]. However, this cannot be used as the only criterion, and it needs to occur in a specific habitat, such as agroforestry landscape under artificial management. Because of this, there are differences in their specific description parameters [49,29], resulting in immature research on the coupling mechanism of ELA. Therefore, it remains a key challenge to use landscape ecology theory to provide protection for agroforestry and surrounding habitat relics in different habitats [132] and to promote ecosystem quality and benefits in a sustainable manner [18].”

 

Comment 7: The overall context of the paper is not very clear, it seems to be a mishmash of information and it is difficult to draw a clear conclusion from the manuscript.

Response 7: Thank you for this comment, we totally agree with your opinion. We have reviewed this manuscript and are aware of the problem. In order to make the overall line of the paper clearer, we have added a description of the framework of the paper in the methods section. The details are as follows: (Pages 4-5, Lines 156-164; Page 5, Lines 237-245)

• “Protocol: Define the scope and purpose of this study.
• Search: Development of search strategies, identification of search strings and selection of search databases.
• Appraisal: To evaluate the quality of retrieved documents and define the quality standards for inclusion and exclusion of documents;
• Synthesis Report: Extract data, quantitatively classify and describe the results, summarize the main progress and landmark achievements, determine the key scientific issues to be solved, and give inspiration in combination with practical problems.”

“According to ELA-related research, we had divided four main research interests, namely, ecosystem quality, landscape pattern, coupling benefit mechanism and landscape optimization design. First, in Chapter 3.1 of Results and Analysis, conduct a quantitative analysis of the annual distribution and content of the retrieval results; Second, in Section 3.2, we identify the global distribution of study areas and their research institutions; Thirdly, in chapters 4.1 and 4.2 of Retrospect and prospect, the research progress and landmark achievements were summarized, as well as key scientific issues were discussed; Ultimately, insights into the benefit enhancement of agroforestry ecosystems in the KRD region were provided in Section 4.3.”

At the same time, we restructured section 4.2 so that the four key questions 4.2.1, 4.2.2, 4.2.3, and 4.2.4 correspond to each of the four points of interest mentioned earlier. section 4.2.5 is a summary of the key questions from the perspective of the research objectives. In addition, we have substantially revised this section and added explicit conclusions as headings to each of the five subsections. The details are as follows: (Pages 17-19, Lines 658-755)

“4.2.1. Clarify key factors affecting ecosystem quality change, with a focus on getting away from habitat-specific studies”

“4.2.2. To solve the current "barrel effect", it is urgent to clarify the relationship between landscape pattern and ecological process in the special artificial ecosystem of agroforestry”

“4.2.3. Scientifically assess the effect of landscape heterogeneity on agroforestry ecosystems, focusing on multi-scale comprehensive analysis combined with scenario simulation techniques”

“4.2.4. Promoting agroforestry landscape optimization practices not only needs to pay attention to the challenges of spatial and temporal dynamics, but also the key lies in conceptual guidance and promoting a change in thinking”

“4.2.5. Continued improvement of service supply capacity urgently requires attention to future climate change and the establishment of a systematic assessment system combined with resilience theory”

 

Comment 8: The conclusion part is less, appropriately increase your own views and discussions.

Response 8: Thank you for this comment, we totally agree with your opinion. Based on your suggestion, we have added our own perspective and discussion to the conclusion. The details are as follows: (Page 22, Lines 891-901)

“Another important point is that the mindset of karst ecological management needs to change from "prevention" to "coexistence", respecting the natural base characteristics of karst's "binary three-dimensional" hydrological structure. The main factor of ecological damage in karst areas is the human-land conflict, i.e. the relationship between human and nature has not been improved. However, with the decoupling of human-land relations due to the massive labor exodus in recent years, we should seize this opportunity to vigorously develop agroforestry and promote the optimization of landscape structure, so as to expand the ecological benefits of agroforestry. Make the optimized agroforestry as a smarter governance measure, taking advantage of its attributes to see rocky outcrops as friends, and change the governance mindset from defensive to receptive.”

 

Comment 9: The authors should introduce the direction and impact of ELA on policy.

Response 9: Thank you for this comment. According to your comments, we have supplemented the direction and impact of ELA on policy in the text and conclusion. The details are as follows: (Page 21, Lines 822-830; Page 22, Lines 901-914)

“At the same time, the transformation of ecological governance thinking in karst areas is also one of the key requirements. The current control of KRD focuses on prevention and control, which is to prevent and control the continuation or aggravation of water and soil loss events, and hope for habitat restoration. This highlights that the current way of thinking is defense, not coexistence. Therefore, we need to change our concepts, expand our thinking, follow the rules, combine the current situation of land use on the basis of prevention and control, and develop more intelligent methods to change our thinking from defensive to accepting.”

“This requires policy guidance that recognizes the environmental benefits provided by agroforestry ecosystems and encourages widespread implementation of optimization measures. However, individual farmers have limited land and can only be developed and optimized at the farm scale. Therefore, this calls for promotion by policy makers with a higher strategic perspective and learning from developed countries that have advocacy, research, and integration as strategic goals and set specific tasks for the various agencies of the Ministry of Agriculture in the development of agroforestry. Meanwhile, future ELA research work should be based on the relationship between humans and nature and economic and ecological needs and also be based on the actual situation of geographical habitats in the KRD region. Combined with the main progress and key scientific questions we summarized, this information can be used to inspire policy optimization of decision makers and land management of landowners and to further promote the supply enhancement of agroforestry ecosystem services.”

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

My scientific comments of the paper's first draft were expertly addressed by the authors. 

However, I believe that the following has to be corrected:Figures 1 and 6 might have clearer font and are a little hazy. 

If the author corrects these small printing mistakes in terms of the quality of the research and its  introduction, I believe it will be acceptable for publication.