Tourists’ Preferences for Traditional Food Products as Indicators of the Market Potential of Underutilised Species in Cambodia

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)

Dear author/s,

thank you for the improved version of the article.

I am not sure about the meaning of the data presented in table 5. Please review it. the p-value should be presented for each of the products (other conventional, other underutilized). At the same time is not clear for me how the percentage was calculated. There should be for instance how many of the total number of respondents that know Cambodian red wine are female and how many male. Please clarify this part. 

I recommend to write the article in an impersonal mode.

Good luck!

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you very much for your comments and suggestions. Hereby are our responses:

• I am not sure about the meaning of the data presented in table 5. Please review it. The p-value should be presented for each of the products (other conventional, other underutilized). At the same time is not clear for me how the percentage was calculated. There should be for instance how many of the total number of respondents that know Cambodian red wine are female and how many male. Please clarify this part.

Answer: The values in Table 5 indicate the respondents' knowledge of local TFPs in relation to their profile. The value indicates what percentage of the total respondents knew about the product. For example, 20.9% of men knew about Cambodian red wine and 74.8% knew about Kampot pepper. In addition, we found your suggestion regarding the p-value useful and have therefore added p-values for each product separately to show any significant differences for each product and socio-demographic characteristic (Table 5 has been changed, but we have not used the track changes mode for better visibility).

 

• I recommend to write the article in an impersonal mode.

Answer: We very much understand your comment and agree that this is the prevailing style of writing scientific papers. However, as the manuscript has undergone language correction, we are concerned about the potential disruption to the flow of the text throughout the study. We would be grateful if you would consider the need to rewrite the manuscript in this case.

Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 2)

The authors have addressed most of comments. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you very much for your comments and suggestions that helped us to improve the manuscript.

Best regards,
Authors

Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)

Dear Authors, thank you for the interesting manuscript!

I would like to suggest some additions for improve your research:

1) The map  with mentioned regions as well as some geographical info about Cambodia could increase the visibility of the investigated country. 

2) Investigated Cambodian regions are popular destinatios for foreign tourists from around the would. Could you give some data about tourist flow there (thousand people, share, ets) for comparing with other regions of Cambodia?

3) Are rest nine TFPs (except Campot peper) also cultivated in investigated three regions? 

4) If you could present the volume of international trade of some of TFPs it would be increase the significance of your research.

5) line 38 - "Italy or France"; line 198 and 338 -  extra punctuation mark and space.

 

Best regards,

Reviewer.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you very much for your comments and suggestions. And also for additional language and typos corrections.

Our responses are attached in the file.

Best regards,
Authors

Author Response File: Author Response.doc

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

Dear author/s,

the topic of the manuscript is interesting, and the results might be useful for development of tourism as long are analyzed the new trends in terms of tourists' behavior as well. However there are several aspects that should be presented:

1. please present clearly the aim of the paper and the research question/research hypotheses at the end of the introduction

2. the last paragraph from the introduction should be related to the material area in a new section. A map with the research area could be added.

3. the data were collected in 2017. During the last years the tourists' behavior has changed. How representative do you think the data are at this moment? 

4. part of the respondents were under 18 years. In most of the countries for this category of subjects should be obtain the permission from the legal representative to participate in the study/survey.

5. the statistic analysis is basic, but as mentioned before the topic is interesting.

6. please mention the theoretical implication of the research. What gap in the literature does it fills. Which are the limitations of the study? What about the managerial implications?

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We acknowledge your comment, which we consider very useful and relevant to our manuscript. In the text below, we demonstrate how these comments were tackled.

Please see the attachment with the modified version of our manuscript.

*****

Dear author/s,

the topic of the manuscript is interesting, and the results might be useful for development of tourism as long are analyzed the new trends in terms of tourists' behavior as well. However there are several aspects that should be presented:

1. please present clearly the aim of the paper and the research question/research hypotheses at the end of the introduction

Answer: We conceptualised and extended the research question of the study. We particularly underlined how our study focuses on the role of local traditional products, both conventional and neglected, and contributes to the diversification of local tourism attractions.

2. the last paragraph from the introduction should be related to the material area in a new section. A map with the research area could be added.

Answer: We moved this paragraph to the methodology part, sub-chapter “Characterisation of selected TFPs” as suggested.

3. the data were collected in 2017. During the last years the tourists' behavior has changed. How representative do you think the data are at this moment?

Answer: Despite our data were collected in 2017, we believe that the contribution to the debate on how tourism and regional products can support rural development is still relevant. During the Covid times, 2019-2021, tourism was decline, but numbers are returning to back to the pre-covid times and even government expects more arrivals. We focused our study primarily on tourists’ perception of conventional and underutilised products. Thus, we believe that our findings are still actual and provide Cambodia government with good insights for further planning in rural development and tourism. Our survey contributes to overall debate on the role of local food in attracting tourists and support rural and agricultural development.

4. part of the respondents were under 18 years. In most of the countries for this category of subjects should be obtain the permission from the legal representative to participate in the study/survey.

Answer: Corrected.

5. the statistic analysis is basic, but as mentioned before the topic is interesting.

Answer: We agree with the reviewer that factorial analysis or regression might be applied in consumer surveys. Nevertheless, statistical methods we used are based on studies dealing with similar topic and they are adequate with respect to the aim of the study and overall message we want to share with the scientific and development community.

6. please mention the theoretical implication of the research. What gap in the literature does it fills. Which are the limitations of the study? What about the managerial implications?

Answer: We extended literature review with additional comments on the research gap. We see main contribution in pointing out the necessity of diversification of local TFPs, with special regard to their certification (recognition by legal systems) and using them through various development programmes, such as “OVOP”. We added also recommendations and implications to the last chapter.

We added following text into the manuscript:

Theoretical concept extension:

It has been documented that a lot of the enjoyment of travelling is associated with trying out local foods [1-4]. Thus, food not only serves to fulfil basic needs but can also be considered as a major tourist attraction especially in certain destinations, such as rum or cigars in Caribbean islands, traditional noodle soup ramen in Japan, or street food markets in Thailand or Vietnam. Furthermore, tourists' consumption of and expenditure on traditional foods are an important driver in developing tourism services and it contributes to development of rural economics and agriculture. Therefore, supporting these can be regarded as an efficient strategy for maximising returns from tourism development. Additionally, the consumption of local ingredients and processed foods minimise imports and leakage of tourism revenue from the local economy [5-7].

Despite of relative success in tourism development, some problems, such as prevailing low-cost backpackers’ tours, low return rates, inadequate infrastructure development, competition with neighbouring, touristically more developed, countries, and lack of diversification in tourism products, including traditional food systems prevail. These limitations are very rarely reflected in scientific literature and overlooked by national policies and hinder potential regional innovative strategies, which would focus on traditional food and tourism to contribute to destination development plans [8-10]. Thus, creating tailor-made market strategies is crucial to increasing local food products' marketability and availability. Information, education, communication, and social marketing have been found to be indispensable components of mobilisation for successful local food intervention programmes. Understanding tourists' perceptions of and preferences for traditional food products (TFPs) is crucial for defining such strategies. The common scientific approach to finding out how tourists relate to food is to study their food preferences or choices using questionnaire surveys [11]. In addition, respondents' perceptions and preferences have previously been proposed as very relevant indicators for tourism market analysis [12].

Aim specification:

We hypothesise that TFPs based on local plant products and traditional culinary systems represents a trade-off for a profitable interaction between tourism and rural development. Tourists have become an important factor influencing local markets and gastronomy. Tourists’ motivation to try local cuisine might lead to frequent or even regular visits of their favourite destinations. Therefore, we investigated tourists' perceptions and preferences of ten representative Cambodian TFPs with an aim to identify the market potential of underutilised crops and provide insights for future tourism and regional development in the country.

5.2. Policy implications and recommendations

Our study also provides suggestions for policy implications and recommendations. Results show how neglecting TFPs by development strategies might lead to the marginalization of local food systems in tourism programmes and bringing less impact on the development of the communities. Nevertheless, tourism has been recognized as an important development opportunity for both urban and rural communities in many countries and must be promoted not to remain incipient and bellow the potential of a country or a region. Cambodia, as relatively small country, needs to diversify attractions for the foreign tourists and TFPs have a very good potential. Generally, local households are aware of positive impact on tourism on their livelihood and community development and local TFPs can became interesting even if they are not blessed with natural or historical sites. Furthermore, findings indicate that benefits from tourism can be positively perceived as employment opportunities that will generate government revenues through taxes. As women plays significant role in agriculture production, promotion of TFPs could lead the empowerment efforts as well. Very important is to link TFPs producers with restaurants and markets to support the sustainability of the whole system. Finally, promotion of local food systems will help to conserve local culture and food habits. Such information should be perceived by policymakers to formulate and develop suitable plans for effective tourism development. In this case, our study provides following practical implications. First, local stakeholders related to tourism, agriculture and rural development have to check and rethink current plans if they do not promote destination attractiveness and local TFPs. Second, current value chains with TFPs must be analysed on their stability and recognition of local products by national and international certification system to ensure food safety control or prevent falsification. Finally, all development and promotion strategies should consider sustainable harvesting of plant species to avoid overexploitation of natural heritage.

5.3. Limitations and future research

Despite of sound practical and theoretical contributions, our study is not without limitations that provide suggestions for any investigations in the future. Our findings are based predominantly on a willingness of respondents to participate in our survey and use English as a language, which might result in an exclusion of some groups of the tourists from our survey. Similarly, future studies could bring interesting insights if they will focus on specific segments of tourists, such as elderly, women or from emerging countries. Additionally, to gain a better insight into local food in destination marketing and development, empirical research is necessary among producers, farmers and processing companies. Such research could support further our recommendations towards policymakers, but also to various nodes along the underutilised species value chain, e.g., increasing awareness and motivations to try local products, identify weaknesses in packaging and labelling.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

 

Tourists' perceptions of and preferences for traditional food products as indicators of market potential of neglected and underutilised species: a Cambodia case study- agriculture-1984574-peer-review-v1

Reviewer’s Comments

Conclusions

There should be a Section on Conclusions which must be followed by another section, “Policy Implications and Recommendations”. I see this study mainly focuses on the analysis of a local issue. Whether the method used in this study can be applied to other regions/countries.

 

Policy implications refer to what the results and findings and conclusions mean for policies and programmes of public sector and non-state actors. Policy implications are suggestive and indicative of broad and specific directions and instruments that can be used to address observed gaps, utilise observed opportunities and correct existing anomalies or inadequacies. Recommendations are what should be done, who should do it and in what conditions and for what. Recommendations are action-based and should be in the form of actionable measures. Recommendations should be actionable, sharp, unambiguous, reflective and specific.

 

There are no policy recommendations in the paper. Provide policy recommendations with actionable items for government, research institutions, development partners, private sector initiatives and civil society interventions. Be cautious not to make any conclusion that is not supported by evidence produced by the study. Also, avoid general statements about policy implications and provide links between conclusions and policy implications. No recommendations should be made that does not derive from the policy implications.

Authors should dedicate a section on discussing the limitations of the study and areas for further research. This section could come after Policy Implications and Recommendations.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We acknowledge your comment, which we consider very useful and relevant to our manuscript as well as very practical for targeted policymakers and other actors. In the text below, we demonstrate how your suggestions were responded and we also include text we added.

Please see the attachment with the modified version of our manuscript as well.

*****

Conclusions

There should be a Section on Conclusions which must be followed by another section, “Policy Implications and Recommendations”. I see this study mainly focuses on the analysis of a local issue. Whether the method used in this study can be applied to other regions/countries.

Policy implications refer to what the results and findings and conclusions mean for policies and programmes of public sector and non-state actors. Policy implications are suggestive and indicative of broad and specific directions and instruments that can be used to address observed gaps, utilise observed opportunities and correct existing anomalies or inadequacies. Recommendations are what should be done, who should do it and in what conditions and for what. Recommendations are action-based and should be in the form of actionable measures. Recommendations should be actionable, sharp, unambiguous, reflective and specific.

There are no policy recommendations in the paper. Provide policy recommendations with actionable items for government, research institutions, development partners, private sector initiatives and civil society interventions. Be cautious not to make any conclusion that is not supported by evidence produced by the study. Also, avoid general statements about policy implications and provide links between conclusions and policy implications. No recommendations should be made that does not derive from the policy implications.

Authors should dedicate a section on discussing the limitations of the study and areas for further research. This section could come after Policy Implications and Recommendations.

Answer: We added proposed section as special paragraph in Conclusion chapter. We extended literature review with additional comments on the research gap. And added also recommendations to discussion part. We also mentioned main limitations of our survey, which we see particularly in recruiting respondents. We used standard methods applied in consumer studies, however there is always potential bias when working with a large number of non-randomly selected respondents.

 We added there two chapters into the manuscript:

5.2. Policy implications and recommendations

Our study also provides suggestions for policy implications and recommendations. Results show how neglecting TFPs by development strategies might lead to the marginalization of local food systems in tourism programmes and bringing less impact on the development of the communities. Nevertheless, tourism has been recognized as an important development opportunity for both urban and rural communities in many countries and must be promoted not to remain incipient and bellow the potential of a country or a region. Cambodia, as relatively small country, needs to diversify attractions for the foreign tourists and TFPs have a very good potential. Generally, local households are aware of positive impact on tourism on their livelihood and community development and local TFPs can became interesting even if they are not blessed with natural or historical sites. Furthermore, findings indicate that benefits from tourism can be positively perceived as employment opportunities that will generate government revenues through taxes. As women plays significant role in agriculture production, promotion of TFPs could lead the empowerment efforts as well. Very important is to link TFPs producers with restaurants and markets to support the sustainability of the whole system. Finally, promotion of local food systems will help to conserve local culture and food habits. Such information should be perceived by policymakers to formulate and develop suitable plans for effective tourism development. In this case, our study provides following practical implications. First, local stakeholders related to tourism, agriculture and rural development have to check and rethink current plans if they do not promote destination attractiveness and local TFPs. Second, current value chains with TFPs must be analysed on their stability and recognition of local products by national and international certification system to ensure food safety control or prevent falsification. Finally, all development and promotion strategies should consider sustainable harvesting of plant species to avoid overexploitation of natural heritage.

5.3. Limitations and future research

Despite of sound practical and theoretical contributions, our study is not without limitations that provide suggestions for any investigations in the future. Our findings are based predominantly on a willingness of respondents to participate in our survey and use English as a language, which might result in an exclusion of some groups of the tourists from our survey. Similarly, future studies could bring interesting insights if they will focus on specific segments of tourists, such as elderly, women or from emerging countries. Additionally, to gain a better insight into local food in destination marketing and development, empirical research is necessary among producers, farmers and processing companies. Such research could support further our recommendations towards policymakers, but also to various nodes along the underutilised species value chain, e.g., increasing awareness and motivations to try local products, identify weaknesses in packaging and labelling.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear authors,

thank you for the improved version of the manuscript. However I encourage you to make some more elaborate statistical analysis, in order to increase the value of your paper. At the same time update the literature review section so it might be underline that the tourist behavior changes during the last years are in accordance with your study and the results are useful.

Good luck!

Author Response

Dear authors, thank you for the improved version of the manuscript. However I encourage you to make some more elaborate statistical analysis, in order to increase the value of your paper. At the same time update the literature review section so it might be underline that the tourist behavior changes during the last years are in accordance with your study and the results are useful.

Answer: First of all, we do appreciate the previous insights and suggestions that have contributed to the higher quality of our manuscript.

Following your recommendation to enhance the value of our paper by further deepening the statistical analysis, we have added a bivariate probit model and an ordered probit model to more to examine the factors that influence consumers' knowledge and behaviour towards underutilised and conventional TFPs and that influence expenditure on traditional foods. We also modified and clarified previous analyses.

We have also updated our literature review and discussion chapters to situate our results in the context of the current situation in the country. We believe that our findings provide important information for stakeholders in Cambodia on how the current gradual increase in tourism to pre-covid values can be used to support rural and agricultural development in the country.