Assessing Food Systems and Their Impact on Common Pool Resources and Resilience

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is an interesting paper and the data are presented well via graphics. I would like to see more on implications for policy, outreach etc.: how  should policy makers, planners, technical assistant providers etc use these findings

Also, why is the study you cite "famous"? That is an odd word choice

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Reviewer 1

I have numbered the comments and provided answers. Before each answer I added a number. Answers are in blue.

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report 
( ) I would like to sign my review report 

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required 
( ) Moderate English changes required 
(x) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required 
( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style 

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1)     This is an interesting paper and the data are presented well via graphics. I would like to see more on implications for policy, outreach etc.: how  should policy makers, planners, technical assistant providers etc use these findings

Answer 1) In L 621 - 627 we explain how a minimum ASC-Index value could be established as a regulation in order to increase the capacity of food system to contribute to food system sustainability. I added in L 315 the sentence that reads “Incentives could be monetary or other types of compensation for having farm-based agroecosystem that provide a larger set of farm-based agroecosystem services. This could help revert the CPR grabbing and instead promote the provisions of CPRs”.   

In L 597 to 606 we show how the ASC-index could be included in standards for organic and sustainable agriculture in order to promote agricultural landscapes that provide a set of agroecosystem services.

In L 608 - 619  we explain that if humans would change the role that is given to agricultural landscapes and instead of regarding them as production units we conceive them as FBAs that provide a set of FBA-services/benefits, then we could also appreciate the contribution of FBAs to local and global common pool recourses. We added the sentence in L 618 that reads: “Changing the role that is given to agriculture can be used as concepts in environmental education for the population in general”

2)     Also, why is the study you cite "famous"? That is an odd word choice

Answer 2) I deleted the first part of the sentence that said “ In a famous article, Hardin [22]…” Now the sentence reads: “Hardin [22] propagated the assumption that…”

peer-review-4086091.v1.pdf

Submission Date

26 March 2019

Date of this review

05 Apr 2019 12:06:57

Reviewer 2 Report

REVIEW REPORT “Assessing food systems and their impact on common pool resources: From robust common property institutions to commons and resilience grabbing and the way back”

The paper aims at analysing the capacity of a set of different food systems to provide agro-ecosystem services through the agro-ecosystem service capacity methodology.

This manuscript presents an extremely interesting piece of research that has been carried out. The topic, as well as the methodological approach, is particularly timely as for research on food systems’ sustainability.

However the paper presents a number of limitations.

First of all, the text is extremely hard to read. Acronyms are used too often. The readability of the paper gets difficult since these acronyms are not very common as it can happen in biology studies (e.g. DNA, RNA, etc.). It is very hard to read the abstract for example, it should be rewritten. Acronyms should totally disappear in the abstract. In the whole text I would suggest to strongly reduce the use of acronyms. For instance, I would say that there is no need to use an acronym for “food system”, for “farm-based agroecosystem” and for “common pool resources”.

LINES 77-79 are not clear.

LINE 141. Citation “Elinor” is wrong. It is “Ostrom” (same error in the reference list).

Sections 2.1.1 and 2.1.2 should not be included in the method chapter.

Sections 150-178 and 189-208 should be at least halved.

Fig.3, table 3, table 1: Captions are too long. They should be reduced and be maximum on 2 lines.

Table 3 is extremely difficult to read


CONCEPTUAL MODEL OF A FOOD SYSTEM:
it should be explained which previous researches have influenced the conception of this model. There are a number of circular models that have described the functioning of a food system. Authors should demonstrate to be aware of literature and previous research efforts that have been developed to model the dynamics of food systems.
Key references can be:

- Ericksen, P. J. (2008). Conceptualizing food systems for global environmental change research. Global environmental change, 18(1), 234-245.

- HLPE Nutrition and food systems (2017) http://www.fao.org/3/a-i7846e.pdf


TYPES OF FOOD SYSTEM:
The reference to Colonna et al is very interesting for this work. However in a scientific paper it is key to manifest an accurate knowledge of the surrounding scientific context. For example it could be explained why authors opted for this kind of classification, while there are other way to classify food system such as through the perspective of productivism, post-productivism, non-productivism, etc. The references below could help the authors to briefly develop this reflection in their paper:

Horst, M. (2019). Changes in Farmland Ownership in Oregon, USA. Land, 8(3), 39.

Wilson, G. A., & Burton, R. J. (2015). ‘Neo-productivist’agriculture: Spatio-temporal versus structuralist perspectives. Journal of Rural Studies, 38, 52-64.


METHODOLOGY:
Authors should try to convince the community about the appropriateness of the choice of their methodology with regards to the research question they try to answer. For doing that, they should mention other potential methods and explain why their assessment method is better than other ones. Some examples could be found in the following references:

- Van Cauwenbergh, N., Biala, K., Bielders, C., Brouckaert, V., Franchois, L., Cidad, V. G., ... & Sauvenier, X. (2007). SAFE—A hierarchical framework for assessing the sustainability of agricultural systems. Agriculture, ecosystems & environment, 120(2-4), 229-242.

- Majewski, E. (2013). Measuring and modelling farm level sustainability. Visegrad Journal on Bioeconomy and Sustainable Development, 2(1), 2-10.

- Allen, T., Prosperi, P., Cogill, B., Padilla, M., & Peri, I. (2018). A Delphi approach to develop sustainable food system metrics. Social Indicators Research, 1-33.

While the research is very promising, the paper still need major work to be improved, especially for enhancing its readability and for the scientific soundness.

Author Response

Reviewer 2

I have numbered the comments and provided answers. Before each answer I added a number. Answers are in blue.

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report 
( ) I would like to sign my review report 

English language and style

(x) Extensive editing of English language and style required 
( ) Moderate English changes required 
( ) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required 
( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style 

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

REVIEW REPORT “Assessing food systems and their impact on common pool resources: From robust common property institutions to commons and resilience grabbing and the way back”

The paper aims at analysing the capacity of a set of different food systems to provide agro-ecosystem services through the agro-ecosystem service capacity methodology.

This manuscript presents an extremely interesting piece of research that has been carried out. The topic, as well as the methodological approach, is particularly timely as for research on food systems’ sustainability.

However the paper presents a number of limitations.

1) First of all, the text is extremely hard to read. Acronyms are used too often. The readability of the paper gets difficult since these acronyms are not very common as it can happen in biology studies (e.g. DNA, RNA, etc.). It is very hard to read the abstract for example, it should be rewritten. Acronyms should totally disappear in the abstract. In the whole text I would suggest to strongly reduce the use of acronyms. For instance, I would say that there is no need to use an acronym for “food system”, for “farm-based agroecosystem” and for “common pool resources”.

Answer 1) As suggested, I have deleted the acronym for food systems (FS) and for farm-based agroecosystem (FBA). However, we had to keep the acronym for common pool resources CPR because in the abstract we can only have 200 words. By deleting the acronym, we were not able to have a proper abstract that had 200 words. Additionally, CPR is a rather common abbreviation as compared to the other two. I hope this is ok with you.

2) LINES 77-79 are not clear.

Answer 2) I have changed the lines now reads “The resilience of those contributing to the CPRs is grabbed by those who acquire the CPR and not contribute to their generation or maintenance”.   See L 89-90

3) LINE 141. Citation “Elinor” is wrong. It is “Ostrom” (same error in the reference list).

Answer 3) We have corrected the mistake in the citation.

4) Sections 2.1.1 and 2.1.2 should not be included in the method chapter.

Answer 3) As suggested I have moved sections 2.1.1. and 2.1.2 to the introduction. Now they are 1.1.1 and 1.1.2

5) Sections 150-178 and 189-208 should be at least halved.

Answer 5.1) Section 150-178 have been reduced and now reads as follows L185-200:

“Regarding the management of CPRs, a further question to be addressed is about who contributes to the provision of a CPR and who benefits from its use. A contribution can be active construction, maintenance work, or restraint in its use. According to Haller [12], Ostrom misses the point that the contribution to a CPR and benefits from it are not necessarily shared equally–also in situations of robust management of CPRs. First, asymmetric power relations within a group using and managing a CPR can account for a management favouring powerful actors over others. Powerful actors can force weaker actors to accept an unequal distribution contribution to and benefits from a CPR. Weaker actors might have to accept an unequal cooperation instead of not benefiting from a CPR at all. Ensminger [10] has developed a useful model to include the role of power relations in the negotiation of rules and regulations that account for the management of CPRs (Figure 2). Secondly, the provision of a CPR can benefit or affect people that are not members of the group that directly uses or manages the resource. On the other hand activities of actors not being involved in the management of a CPR can affect its quality. This shows that not all actors being affected or affecting a CPR might be included in its management. Such indirect impacts are described as externalities in economic terms. Some of these externalities can be very vague and reach a global scale.  This poses the question of whom should be included in the management of a CPR if externalities affect or are affected by a large group of actors”.

Answer 5.2 ) I have reduced Section 189-208 and now reads as follows in L 213-225:

“Food systems, link a group or groups of consumers with actors that contribute towards the satisfaction of the food needs of these groups. In addition to satisfying food needs, food systems provide a range of other goods and services. Such additional goods and services can be income opportunities, increases in biodiversity, CO2 sequestration or enhanced resilience. These goods and services benefit different actors of the food systems, and, more indirectly through impacts on the ecological and socio-economic environment, all people living on our planet [20]. Food systems rely on natural resources and affect their management. These natural resources include the atmosphere, freshwater, genetic diversity, soil, pollinators, land, etc. Some of these resources are managed through CPR institutions, others are managed by state or private property institutions. Lack of adequate management institutions results in open access constellation with no measures in place to prevent overexploitation. Different types of food systems tend to have different impacts on the management of natural resources and contribute differently towards their maintenance and availability. For a detailed description of food systems and their interlinks, see Figure 2.

6) Fig.3, table 3, table 1: Captions are too long. They should be reduced and be maximum on 2 lines.

Answer 6) I have reduced the caption of figure 3 it now reads:

“Conceptual model of a food system. Food systems are part of the global ecological environment, and their activities depend on it and shape it at the same time”.

For table 3 now reads:

“Example of an empty Agroecosystem Service Matrix (ASM)”

And table 1 now reads:

Now reads “Food system characteristics of the food systems in Bolivia and Kenya”.    

7) Table 3 is extremely difficult to read

Answer 7) I agree it is difficult to read. However the format of the table comes from a previous publication of the method [1]. It is the best possible format to include all the formulas and the data required for the assessment. We have inserted a new figure with better image quality. Yet, we are open to further suggestions.

8) CONCEPTUAL MODEL OF A FOOD SYSTEM:
it should be explained which previous researches have influenced the conception of this model. There are a number of circular models that have described the functioning of a food system. Authors should demonstrate to be aware of literature and previous research efforts that have been developed to model the dynamics of food systems.
Key references can be:

- Ericksen, P. J. (2008). Conceptualizing food systems for global environmental change research. Global environmental change, 18(1), 234-245.

- HLPE Nutrition and food systems (2017) http://www.fao.org/3/a-i7846e.pdf

I have added the references that I have used to build the conceptual model.

Answer 8) The caption now reads “Conceptual model of a food system. Food systems are part of the global ecological environment, and their activities depend on it and shape it at the same time. Based on [20, 27-29]

9) TYPES OF FOOD SYSTEM:
The reference to Colonna et al is very interesting for this work. However in a scientific paper it is key to manifest an accurate knowledge of the surrounding scientific context. For example it could be explained why authors opted for this kind of classification, while there are other way to classify food system such as through the perspective of productivism, post-productivism, non-productivism, etc. The references below could help the authors to briefly develop this reflection in their paper:

Horst, M. (2019). Changes in Farmland Ownership in Oregon, USA. Land, 8(3), 39.

Wilson, G. A., & Burton, R. J. (2015). ‘Neo-productivist’agriculture: Spatio-temporal versus structuralist perspectives. Journal of Rural Studies, 38, 52-64.

Answer 9) Thank you for the suggested literature, I have read it and added it to the manuscript. I have added a sentence in L 257-262 to further explain why we use Colonnas reference. The sentence reads: “Although  there are deferent approaches to describe and assess food systems [27, 31-35], Colonna et al.[2] provides a set of differentiating variables useful to draw borders between one food system and the other. Because of the aforesaid argument we use the five-ideal food systems described by Colonna [2]”.  

10) METHODOLOGY:
Authors should try to convince the community about the appropriateness of the choice of their methodology with regards to the research question they try to answer. For doing that, they should mention other potential methods and explain why their assessment method is better than other ones. Some examples could be found in the following references:

- Van Cauwenbergh, N., Biala, K., Bielders, C., Brouckaert, V., Franchois, L., Cidad, V. G., ... & Sauvenier, X. (2007). SAFE—A hierarchical framework for assessing the sustainability of agricultural systems. Agriculture, ecosystems & environment, 120(2-4), 229-242.

- Majewski, E. (2013). Measuring and modelling farm level sustainability. Visegrad Journal on Bioeconomy and Sustainable Development, 2(1), 2-10.

- Allen, T., Prosperi, P., Cogill, B., Padilla, M., & Peri, I. (2018). A Delphi approach to develop sustainable food system metrics. Social Indicators Research, 1-33.

Answer 10) Thank you for the very interesting literature. I have read the literature and included it the text. I have written a new paragraph in order to explain why the ASC-index was the best tool for this study. Please see L 106-120 now reads: “There is a growing body of literature on studies that assess sustainability of food systems [17], the multifunctionality of agricultural landscapes [18-22] or cultural landscape ecosystems [9, 10]. We use the Agroecosystem Service Capacity (ASC) approach [23] that allows comparing different farm-based agroecosystems and their capacity to provide agroecosystem services. The ASC-index approach was inspired by the paradigm shift suggested by Perfecto, Vandermeer and Wright [24], which integrates conservation and agriculture in high-quality landscape patches [23].The ASC-index is grounded on the methodological approach of Burkhard, Kroll [25] that study landscapes’ capacities to provide ecosystem services [26]. We selected the ASC-index framework because: Fist, it allows to assess farms not solely as units of biomass production, but as comprehensive components that have the capacity to produce biomass as well as other farm-based agroecosystem services [23]. Second, the ASC-index uses data that is generated at farm level with semi-structured interviews and visual tools for soil assessment. Last but not least, the ASC-index allows to create maps that can help visualize the capacities of farm-based agroecosystems to provide farm-based agroecosystem services. The latter is useful to make the information easily accessible for non-scientific arena and decision makers. The method is described in summary in section 2.4. and in detail Augstburger [23]”.

While the research is very promising, the paper still need major work to be improved, especially for enhancing its readability and for the scientific soundness.

Submission Date

26 March 2019

Date of this review

13 Apr 2019 00:11:21©

 1996-2019 MDPI (Basel, Switzerland) unless otherwise stated

1.              Augstburger, H., et al., Agroecosystem Service Capacity Index –

A methodological approach. LANDSCAPE ONLINEONLINE, 2019(64): p. 1-48.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

INTRODUCTION

Very well documented and written.

I found very interesting the argument about the investing in agriculture infrastructure as “Commons grabbing” (infrastructures which do not increase availability and do not contribute to the maintenance on the CPR, common pool resources no longer managed commonly)

L.141: References 21 and 25 are the same, but in 25 the surname is swapped by the name (Elinor instead of Ostrom).

L.150: In Figure 1 it is advisable to cite that this principles are stated by Ostrom. I.e. Table of Ostrom’s Design Principles…

Table 1: Review the writing, there are several typographic mistakes, for example. Input: seeds Agroecological Bolivia: “…the rest are produced in the agroecosystem in (SHOULD BE OR) bought locally”. Same row, next column: “in the in informal market”

RESULTS

3.1 ASC of FS

Remarkable finding about the inverse relation about the size of the area of the FBA and the ASC, which is the scientific demonstration that in food systems “larger is not better”. Small scale farms contain are more complex and diverse and therefore provide a wider range of services.

3.3 CPR compliance assessment tool

The aim of this part of the paper is not clear, since two different objectives are mixed up:

1.       “how close or far a FS is or not to a common property regime of natural resources as described by Ostrom” (L. 387-388). This question considers a FS as if it was a CPR.

2.       “Do the production activities of this FS depend on and contribute or not to CPRs management that comply with the eight principles of robust CPRs?” (L. 392-393). This question considers FS and the CPR separate entities.

As the aims are blurry, the contents of Table 5 are sometimes answering one question and sometimes the other, and the evaluation is not achieved.

Table 5. Review writing as in Table 1. The title could be simplified, now it seems too reiterative. Row Principle 1 answers question 1 and considers the FS a CPR. I.e. Principle 1- Agroecological Bolivia: “It is clear who is part and who is not part of this FS”. To answer Question 2, you should explain how the people engaged in the FS integrate within the wider community that is using the CPR. And the following sentence “the common ground represented…” does speak only about the FS itself, but does no answer how the FS contributes to define the group of users and whether the CPRs used by the FS are defined or not.

Row Principle 2: answers question 1

Rows Principles 3,4,5,6,7,8: answer question 2 but in such a general way that the reader does not grasp the contribution of the FS to the CPR management.

Table 5 should address clearly one of the two questions. To assess the contribution of FS to CPRs management, there should be analysed all the CPRs that is using and managing each FS. This might be too complicated, so I suggest choosing the most relevant CPR for each FS.

DISCUSSION

Brilliantly discussed and well included the case study results into the global conclusions, such as how agroecological or indigenous FS subsidize agroindustrial FS. Very well argued: non contribution of agroindustrial FS is CPR grabbing .

Minor remark: The first sentence is too general and leads to misunderstanding of the complexity of FS contribution to environment. Please put it into context (i.e. some FS have had negative impacts) or remove it.

“FS activities, mostly production activities, that take place in FBAs have had negative socio-environmental impacts…”

The paper contributes to strengthen the argument that agroecological and indigenous FS contribute to society not only producing food but also providing several other services and contributing to CPRs, using valuable and innovative tools to measure it, as the ASC index.

Author Response

Reviewer 3 new

I have numbered the comments and provided answers. Before each answer I added a number. Answers are in blue.

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report 
( ) I would like to sign my review report 

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required 
( ) Moderate English changes required 
(x) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required 
( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style 

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

INTRODUCTION

1)     Very well documented and written.

Answer 1) Thank you very much for the motivating remark!

2)     I found very interesting the argument about the investing in agriculture infrastructure as “Commons grabbing” (infrastructures which do not increase availability and do not contribute to the maintenance on the CPR, common pool resources no longer managed commonly)

Answer 2) Thank you we found this argument fundamentally interesting also.

3)     L.141: References 21 and 25 are the same, but in 25 the surname is swapped by the name (Elinor instead of Ostrom).

Answer 3) Thank you, we have changed this accordingly. Now Ostrom is ref 21.

4)     L.150: In Figure 1 it is advisable to cite that this principles are stated by Ostrom. I.e. Table of Ostrom’s Design Principles…

Answer 4) As suggested I have added a reference in the title of the figure. Additionally there is one in the figure that states the page number where the table is found in the reference.

5)     Table 1: Review the writing, there are several typographic mistakes, for example. Input: seeds Agroecological Bolivia: “…the rest are produced in the agroecosystem in (SHOULD BE OR) bought locally”. Same row, next column: “in the in informal market”

Answer 5) I corrected Inputs: Seeds to Input: seed same for agrochemicals.  I corrected the part “the rest are produced in the agroecosystem in (SHOULD BE OR) bought locally”. Now it seas: “the rest are produced in the agroecosystem or bought locally”. I corrected the: “in the in informal market” now it seas  “sold in the informal market”. I have revised the whole table and found a couple of typographic mistakes.

RESULTS

3.1 ASC of FS

6)     Remarkable finding about the inverse relation about the size of the area of the FBA and the ASC, which is the scientific demonstration that in food systems “larger is not better”. Small scale farms contain are more complex and diverse and therefore provide a wider range of services.

Answer 6)  Thank you for the positive remark. We were very happy to be able to demonstrate that “larger is not better”, that we need complex patches of multifunctional landscapes. Mostly provided by agroecological or indigenous food system.

3.3 CPR compliance assessment tool

7)     The aim of this part of the paper is not clear, since two different objectives are mixed up:

1.       “how close or far a FS is or not to a common property regime of natural resources as described by Ostrom” (L. 387-388). This question considers a FS as if it was a CPR.

2.       “Do the production activities of this FS depend on and contribute or not to CPRs management that comply with the eight principles of robust CPRs?” (L. 392-393). This question considers FS and the CPR separate entities.

As the aims are blurry, the contents of Table 5 are sometimes answering one question and sometimes the other, and the evaluation is not achieved.

Answer 7) We have noticed that the way it was written before led to misunderstanding. We meant to has only one question and not two. We have re written this section and we have clarified this aspect by putting one clear question that now reads as follows (L455 479):  

“Up to now, we have gained insights on the different ASC- index capacities of food system. We go one step further, and assess the relation between the ASC-index values and the contribution of food system towards a management of CPRs that complies with the eight principles of robust CPR management as proposed by Ostrom [27]. Certain food systems tend more towards fostering and depending on natural resources management as CPRs (e.g. indigenous food systems), whereas others lean more towards private property regimes and open access situations (e.g. agro-industrial horticulture operations).

The objective of the common pool resource assessment tool is to assess the relation betweeen ASC-index of food system and the level of compliance of the resource’s management with the eight principles of robust CPR management proposed by Ostrom [21]. In order to develop this tool the guiding question is: To what degree the resources management of a food system complies with the principles of Ostrom?

For the construction of the assessment tool we proceeded as follows: First we listed the eight principles robust CPR management. Second, we assessed the degree of compliance of the food system’s resources management with each individual principle of Ostrom[27]. For that purpose we use the following ordinal scale: 0=no compliance (e.g. dependence on private and state property regimes or open access constellations, contributing to transformations of CPRs to state or private property or open access), 1=some compliance (e.g. dependence on private and state property regimes as well as CPR institutions or contribution towards a transformation of state and private property regimes or open access situations towards CPRs management) and 2=full compliance (e.g. general dependence on CPRs and contribution towards a transformation of state and private property regimes or open access situations towards CPRs management). The CPRs compliance assessment relies on an analysis of selected literature on different food systems in the study area (see table 5)”.

Taking into consideration the new  question we revised table 5. Please see the according modifications in table 5.

8)     Table 5. Review writing as in Table 1. The title could be simplified, now it seems too reiterative. Row Principle 1 answers question 1 and considers the FS a CPR. I.e. Principle 1- Agroecological Bolivia: “It is clear who is part and who is not part of this FS”. To answer Question 2, you should explain how the people engaged in the FS integrate within the wider community that is using the CPR. And the following sentence “the common ground represented…” does speak only about the FS itself, but does no answer how the FS contributes to define the group of users and whether the CPRs used by the FS are defined or not.

Answer 8) I have changed the title form: “CPR compliance assessment of six production systems belonging to six different food systems” now it is: “CPR compliance assessment of six food systems”. For the rest of the comments please refer to answer 7.

9)     Row Principle 2: answers question 1

Answer 9) Pleas see answer 7

10)  Rows Principles 3,4,5,6,7,8: answer question 2 but in such a general way that the reader does not grasp the contribution of the FS to the CPR management.

Answer 10) Pleas see answer 7

11)  Table 5 should address clearly one of the two questions. To assess the contribution of FS to CPRs management, there should be analysed all the CPRs that is using and managing each FS. This might be too complicated, so I suggest choosing the most relevant CPR for each FS.

Answer 11) Pleas see answer 7

DISCUSSION

12)  Brilliantly discussed and well included the case study results into the global conclusions, such as how agroecological or indigenous FS subsidize agroindustrial FS. Very well argued: non-contribution of agroindustrial FS is CPR grabbing.

Answer 12) Thank you! We are happy to know that the arguments are clear.

13)  Minor remark: The first sentence is too general and leads to misunderstanding of the complexity of FS contribution to environment. Please put it into context (i.e. some FS have had negative impacts) or remove it.

Answer 13) L 179 -181. I have separated the first sentence in two sentences to make more understandable. Now reads (L484-486):

“Some food system activities, mostly production activities, that take place in farm-based agroecosystems have negative socio-environmental impacts. Yet food system activities have the capacity to provide multifunctional farm-based agroecosystems that can benefit local and global CPRs and their management.”

14)  “FS activities, mostly production activities, that take place in FBAs have had negative socio-environmental impacts…”

Answer 14) Pleas see answer 13.

15)  The paper contributes to strengthen the argument that agroecological and indigenous FS contribute to society not only producing food but also providing several other services and contributing to CPRs, using valuable and innovative tools to measure it, as the ASC index.

Answer 15) Thank you for the positive remarks they are very much motivating!

Submission Date

26 March 2019

Date of this review

10 Apr 2019 13:00:51

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 4 Report

This is a very innovative paper, and I think it would make a strong contribution to the journal. While the core of this paper is in good condition, a few improvements are needed before publication:

First, the writing needs to be strengthened across the paper, as many paragraphs are too long, too wordy/complicated, or not as clear as they could be. This is evident from the start, as the title is a bit too complicated for example.

Second, the methods section could use a bit more detail and might be better suited to be its own section.

Third, some of the graphics were a bit hard to read and could be improved for clarity.

Otherwise, I find the paper to be a good contribution to the field at large.

Author Response

Reviewer 4

I have numbered the comments and provided answers. Before each answer I added a number. Answers are in blue.

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report 
( ) I would like to sign my review report 

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required 
(x) Moderate English changes required 
( ) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required 
( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style 

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a very innovative paper, and I think it would make a strong contribution to the journal. While the core of this paper is in good condition, a few improvements are needed before publication:

1)     First, the writing needs to be strengthened across the paper, as many paragraphs are too long, too wordy/complicated, or not as clear as they could be. This is evident from the start, as the title is a bit too complicated for example.

Answer 1) We have shortened the title of the paper as suggested. The title now reads: “Assessing food systems and their impact on common pool resourcesandresilience”

Additionally we have revised the paper and shortened sentences where possible.  

2)     Second, the methods section could use a bit more detail and might be better suited to be its own section.

Answer 1) In order to add detail and make the method more understandable I have added a new figure that explains the method in a nutshell.  Please see the new figure 4.

However, the method is explained in full detail in a previous paper [1].

You suggested for the methods “might be better suited to be its own section”. For this I have I have moved sections 2.1.1. and 2.1.2 from the methods section to the introduction. This allows to have only the method topics in the section.  Now they are 1.1.1 and 1.1.2

3)     Third, some of the graphics were a bit hard to read and could be improved for clarity.

Answer 1) I have improved the quality of table 4 and of figure 5 and 6. I have also corrected minor mistakes in figure 8.

Otherwise, I find the paper to be a good contribution to the field at large.

Submission Date

26 March 2019

Date of this review

04 Apr 2019 22:45:15

1.         Augstburger, H., et al., Agroecosystem Service Capacity Index –

A methodological approach. LANDSCAPE ONLINEONLINE, 2019(64): p. 1-48.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The authors have adequately reworked the manuscript according to the peer review report.