The Impact of Tourism on Energy Consumption: A Sectoral Analysis for the Most Visited Countries in the World

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This manuscript is well organised. However, in our opinion, it is necessary:

1) The introduction must present the research questions about the object of study. Furthermore, it is necessary to capture the reader's attention. The authors should present a story about the topic they are studying and investigating.

2) The literature review needs more improvement and more detail. Authors should seek to extend the literature review. A meta-analysis of the last five years is necessary. 

3) In methodology: We thought the authors could present the hypotheses to be tested and justify them according to the literature review.

4) Analysis of results (econometric study): The authors demonstrate knowledge of recent econometric techniques. In this section, we suggest the VIF test (to evaluate multicollinearity) to complement the tests presented. The econometric results are interesting but need to be explained in more detail. A scientific article is not a statistical exercise. Furthermore, it would be interesting to compare the results with panel quantile regression (PQR) or panel cointegration models (FMOLS, DOLS) if possible and if the authors consider that this comment improves the manuscript.

5)The conclusions need to be extended further, even though there is a previous section where the results are discussed. The implications for economic policy and society must be clear and objective and, if possible, present some recommendations for policymakers.

The manuscript only needs to establish some connections between the sections, which the authors will take care of in the next version.

Author Response

We thank reviewer 1 for the comments. All comments have been addresses. Please, see the attached document. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript titled “The Impact of Tourism on Energy Consumption: A Sectoral Analysis for the Most Visited Countries in the World” has been reviewed. This manuscript needs major revisions; please refer to the specific comments.

Abstract
- The authors should motivate the choice of the variables and indicate the underlying time-period. A key policy implication might be added as a concluding sentence of Abstract section.

Introduction

- The Introduction section is not effective in motivating the study and does neither discuss any policy-level problem nor provide potential solutions. The Introduction section does not contain research objectives and hypothesis. How about generalizability of the results? Why selected this time-period, its justification should be added. Why selected this investigative laboratory? You should give more details on the novelty of your work. The progress against the most recent state-of-the-art similar studies from your/other groups of countries should be clearly stated. Use third-party materials to identify the policy-level problem prevailing in the selected countries. Kindly discuss logical connection between the variables. You might provide the structure of the article in the last paragraph of the Introduction section.  

Literature review

- There is no debate among studies in the Literature review section, consequently it fails to identify the knowledge/research gap. Literature review should be reorganized to compare and contract previous studies focusing on the underlying variables. In addition, there are many old articles used in this study, and it is strongly recommended to consider more recent studies ranging from 2021-2023 to motivate the manuscript properly, for instance (https://doi.org/10.3390/en16021002; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gr.2023.04.008). The subheading “Knowledge gap” should be added to summarize literature gaps.

Methodology

- There is no theoretical framework behind the model. It is not clear how the authors have derived the model. What is the logical connection between the variables? The theoretical framework will be followed by empirical model.

- There should be a strong reason to choose the time span from 2000 to 2018. If possible try to update your time span.

- Authors are advised to test the existence of cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity.

Empirical results

- The results are merely displayed with no economic intuitions and it is not clear whether these results contradict or support the existing policies. The economic meaning of the results could be discussed in more detail.

Conclusion

- This section repeats the empirical findings and it took about 50% of the section which is not desirable. The findings should be presented within a maximum of 4 sentences. Moreover, the study fails to present the policy implications, limitations of the study and recommendations for future research. The policy implications should be based on the discussion of the findings and should not surpass these findings.

Minor editing of English language required

Author Response

We thank reviewer 2 for the comments. All comments have been addresses. Please, see the attached document

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper can be accept in present form. 

The grammar is fine. However, the authours can improve a bit the link between sections. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper can be accepted in the present form.