Biodiversity of the Cocoa Agroforests of the Bengamisa-Yangambi Forest Landscape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Summary:

The authors examine the diversity of structure of agroforestry communities in the DRC. In particular, they examine agroforestry systems that focus on the production of cocoa. The authors sample cocoa plantations along a major road located in the study region. They establish four zones of approximately 2500 square meters, within which they establish multiple plots for sampling vegetation. There is an existing degradation gradient along this road, with areas closer to Kisangani being more heavily degraded than areas farther north. As such, a major question that they examine is how distance from Kisangani influences composition and diversity.

They also are interested in looking at the composition and diversity of species that are known to be associated with cocoa plantations or not. Unfortunately, the authors do not do a great job of explaining the rationale for this analysis, or how species were classified as associated or non-associated. Regardless, they were interested in determining how distance from Kisangani impact the abundance and diversity of these associated and non-associated species.

Confirming their expectations, they find that diversity declines with proximity to Kisangani. They also observed important differences in stem density, composition, and basal area across the four different zones. They go into great depth describing differences in associated and non-associated species across the four zones, although again, the foundations for these results are not entirely clear. Finally, they observe a strong positive relationship between the density of cocoa-associated trees and overall forest diversity. They use this finding to suggest that cocoa agroforestry systems with highly associated species are capable of enhancing forest diversity. While this is an interesting result, the authors currently do not provide adequate comparisons to non-associated species (see details below).

Overall, I find this to be an interesting manuscript and highly relevant to the readership of Forests. Some significant work on the organization of the manuscript is first in order, and I do have a major concern about the results presented in figure 4. The authors will need to provide convincing evidence for the conclusions they glean from this analysis (again, see below).

General Comments:

The introduction section is well written and clear. I think it could be shortened somewhat. Currently, there are many parts that seem repetitive. Specifically, the benefits of agroforestry seem to be repeated in several places throughout the introduction. This should be avoided. I also think that there is currently too much background information on the socioeconomic status and trends of the region, as well as on the history of cocoa farming and agrofroesry. Given the journal that this is being submitted to, the authors should focus primarily on the biology of the study system. It would also be helpful to have clearly defined research questions spelled out at the end of the introduction section. Numbered questions would be helpful.

Similar to introduction, I am wondering if there is a bit too much background information about the study site. I am not sure all of this information is entirely relevant to the main focus of the manuscript. The authors may want to reduce the length of the materials and methods section, particularly the subsection on study area.

The analyses used in this research are really quite simple. However, the description of them in the ‘Data analysis’ section is highly confusing. Most importantly, the authors cannot refer to the lettered models without first describing what they are. Currently, references to model F, P, FP, etc. are used extensively, but a reader will have no idea what these models are/mean. This is highly confusing. It also seems like a huge amount of time is spent describing these very simple methods. In the end, the authors measured very standard diversity metrics and used simple regression models. I do not think it requires nearly 100 lines and eight paragraphs to explain this. Overly lengthy writing seems to be a theme throughout the manuscript.

Figure 4 shows the relationship between the density of cocoa-associated plants and overall species richness. This is a core result of the manuscript and one the authors use to support the hypothesis that forest diversity is promoted by cocoa-associated forest species. This is fine, except that the authors do not produce additional relationships showing no or weaker relationships with non-cocoa-assocaited species. This is very important to do, and the exclusion of these analyses puts the results and conclusions into serious question. There is a well-known relationship between stem density and diversity, so the relationship the authors show in figure 4 is not exactly surprising. The authors must show that this relationship is stronger for cocoa-assocaited species than it is for non-cocoa associated species and for all species combined.

I am also concerned about the predictor variable ‘distance from Kisangani. Specifically, it is unclear whether this is the only major city in close proximity to the study sites. Looking at figure 1, it looks like there is at least one other town or city, but distance from this location was not included as a predictor variable. Also, the authors should definitely consider how other variables associated with distance from the city might influence their results. Cities are not established non-randomly, and are likely strongly correlated with the environment. The authors should thus attempt to convince readers that distance from human populations is indeed the primary driver of their results, and not some associated environmental factor.

A major general criticism that I have with this work currently is that the primary message that the authors are trying to convey does not come across easily. I think this is related to other points made above regarding a lack of clear research questions and overly wordy writing. Likewise, the discussion section does not do a very good job of synthesizing findings and providing simple take-home messages to the reader. The discussion is cordoned off into many subsections as is the methods and results section, which is generally OK, except that there is currently no synthesis of research findings. An easy first step at addressing this criticism is providing a brief summary paragraph at the beginning of the discussion section. This paragraph should highlight the most interesting and relevant results that the authors found. Furthermore, a conclusions paragraph at the end might also help clarify what the core findings of the project were.

While the overall writing was very good, there are still some problems with clarity and organization that need to be remedied. I have tried to point these out in the line comments below. However, this is not an exhaustive list my any means, and the authors should use my comments below as a guide for improving the overall readability of the manuscript. Again, this won’t be too much fork, as I found the writing in general to be good.

 

Specific Comments:

L1: The title implies a purely descriptive paper, which will not be of interest to many readers. Can you make the title more interesting, focusing on a specific research topic or question?

L9: Should be ‘agroforestry’?

L10: Why is the part in parentheses so long? At first it seemed like you were just spelling out what the acronym for REDD+ is.

L13: The switch to ‘traditional systems’ here is unclear and confusing. It is unclear how this sentence follows previous ones.

L15: As with title, you are setting this up for a purely descriptive paper, which will not be very interesting. Is there any way you can reframe this around some sort of research question or hypothesis? Also, what really does ‘evaluate the floristic diversity’ actually mean?

L16: What analyses? You have not mentioned or described any analyses.

L18: You switch back to descriptions of your study system, which does not belong after your results.

L21: Here is your first mention of comparing forests to palm plantations. This should already be clear from your first paragraph. Also, this design seems very well suited to spelling out an actual hypothesis or research question (i.e., regarding the role of forest cover, disturbance, land use, etc. on diversity). I think my points about moving away from a purely descriptive study to a more hypothesis-driven one will be very easy to do.

L25: Here too, mention and focus on deforestation is not properly introduced above.

L41: Not clear what the ‘etc.’ would refer to here.

L43: Replace ‘also emerges as’ with ‘is also’

L44: Isn’t ‘provides food to people’ the same thing as ‘fulfilling subsistence requirements?’ This seems repetitive.

L49: I think ‘agroforests’ should be replaced with ‘agroforestry’

L67: Replace ‘At the same time’ with “Despite the benefits of agroforestry practices’ or something similar.

L68: You are switching topics too much here. The previous paragraph described the benefits of agroforestry. Then, the opening sentence of this paragraph suggests you will be laying out the negatives of agroforestry. Instead, you switch right back to the benefits with this sentence starting with ‘However,’ Your paragraph structure and organization could be improved. Specifically, you either need to make this entire paragraph about the negatives of agroforestry, or delete/replace the first sentence of this paragraph.

L92: Replace ‘minor’ with ‘small.’

L100: This sentence is hard to understand “In cocoa agroforests, whether for biodiversity conservation or as a response to climate change (adaptation and mitigation),…” Please rewrite.

L113: Be aware of changing tense (present vs past). You need to be consistent with the tense you choose throughout the entire manuscript.

L146: What exactly do you mean by the ‘dynamics of plant diversity?’ I don’t believe you are measuring any change of time, for example. Please clarify this or reword the sentence.

L146: Here you are beginning to actually describe your study design, so I think this is better suited to the next subsection.

L150: The map is very helpful

L158: Please clarify the part in parentheses. Does this indicate that all plantations were at least 0.5 hectares?

L159: Give the actual plot dimensions instead of just the area.

L159: Do you mean ‘within’ instead of ‘corresponding?’ Are you trying to say that four plots were established within a 2500 m^2 area? This is not clear how you have it written currently.

L163: The way this sentence is written implies that the ‘cocoa-associated plants’ are actually ‘on’ the cocoa tree. Is this accurate? Also, why different heights for measuring diameter?

L163: What do you mean ‘in general?’ There were either 25 forests surveyed or not. Please be more clear.

L167: Do you mean trees here? How could there be multiple ‘agroforests’ within a 25x25 m area? Please make this clear.

L170: What is meant by ‘uses?’ Do all species have a clear use?

L172: This categorization seems highly important to your analysis, so a little more detail on how the INERA classification was made would be useful to include here. It really isn’t even clear what you mean by suitable currently. This ends up making reading the results and discussion section somewhat difficult to understand, since you spend a great deal of time discussing the composition of suitable versus unsuitable plants.

L180: I don’t really understand what this first sentence means.

L180: A reader will not understand what you are referring to by ‘Model F.’

L181: Change ‘are dominated by’ to ‘were composed primarily of’

L181: Also, what exactly is meant by ‘forest species?’ You are sampling forests, so it is not surprising that most of the species sampled are ‘forest species?’ Please clarify this.

L183: Referring to these lettered models is very confusing. They have not been mentioned previously, have not been defined, so a reader has no clue what you are referring to. Either explain first what these models are, or rewrite this section.

L185: This first sentence is overly long and complicated. Change to “We measured species diversity, Shannon diversity, ….etc.”

L191: Font changes here?

L191: You have not made it clear what you mean by ‘structure.’

L192: Change ‘equitability’ to ‘evenness’

L212: I don’t understand the bold text. This does not seem to be appropriate formatting.

L248: “Species”

L249: Replace ‘in’ with ‘across.’

L249: Does the 90 species refer to all 6558 stems to just the 996 cocoa-associated stems? I think this sentence needs to be rewritten some to make it more clear.

L270: These are smoothed/averaged rarefaction curves. You should provide confidence bands around them. But maybe this will look messy with four lines plotting on top of each other.

L291: Replace ‘to’ with ‘with’

L293: And ‘to’ with ‘with’

L296: I do not like the use of parentheses in the paragraph. It is poor writing. Just write out “For Elaeis guinneens, we sampled 110 plants from zone A, 179 plants from Zone B,….” Etc.

L312: it remains lost on me what exactly is meant by suitable and unsuitable. In the methods section, you really only mention that you referred to a previously published list. But we need to know more about what makes a species suitable or unsuitable for cocoa production. This is a fundamental aspect of your manuscript, so it needs to be crystal clear.

L314: What do you mean ‘grouped in 19 species?’

L317: What do you mean by “In considering each zone?

L322: The writing quality seems poorer in this section than in others

L415: change ‘the authors of [53]” to just “Temgoua et al. [53] inventoried…”

L418: What is meant by ‘seem smaller?’

L424: Change ‘installed’ to ‘planted’ or ‘established’

Author Response

Hello dear reviewer,
While we thank you for your comments, we are sending you a file of our responses as an attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Review of the manuscript “Biodiversity of the cocoa agroforests of the Bengamisa-Yangambi forest landscape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)”.

 

General comments:

Without doubt the study belong to the most important studies dealing with agroforestry systems. Authors analyzed the local agroforests connected with the main crop, cocoa, from many points of view and their work deserves appreciation.

On the other hand, authors do not mention the main factor influencing the present status of agroforests. The present structure of agroforests mentioned in the study was formed firstly by the wishes of farmers and secondly by the natural succession. The major part of tree species found in sample plots are pioneer tree species or light-demanding species which farmers let to grow. Thus, farmers´ wishes are the most decisive for structure of their agroforests. 

In such broad study authors did not avoid small errors or controversial statements.  See specific comments.

Specific comments:

Line 39: The sentence “….and enhancing rural livelihood…” should be replaced by “…and enhancing income from rural livelihood….”

Line 63: Examples should be more than only one. Let me propose “….such as protection of the soils and better water management.”

Line 65: The name of cited authors (Gockowski and Sonwa) are useless.

Lines 87-88: The sentence should be modified. Let me propose the version “In the Mambasa region, 1250 hectares (ha) of forest-cover cocoa has been planted within the context of the national REDD+ program [29].“

Line 90: The sentence “….there is insufficient data…” should be replaced by “…there are insufficient data….”

Line 187: The index Piélou´s equitability should be renamed as Piélou´s evenness index. Such modification should be done in the whole text.

Legends in figures and tables: Explanations in parentheses are useless. The abbreviations and marks of various models and zones are explained in the text.

Table 3: The species Petersianthus macrocarpus is used mainly as source of wood from Côte d’Ivoire to the DRC (locally named essia, esia, abalé, abing and owewe). How come in the table 3 the main use is caterpillar.

Lines 419-421: Explanations of differences of diversities among various agroforest seems to be incomplete. The difference between Africa´s and South America´s agroforests (Colombia) is mainly caused by different ecosystems developed in Africa and South America.

Chapter 4.6.: Seems to be useless. If the authors want to stress that the study is limited and further studies are needed some statements in this chapter belong to the chapters Introduction and Conclusion.

Lines 555-557. I disagree with the statement that model F may be the most appropriate. As I stress above that the structure of agroforests is dominantly influenced by farmers according to their wish and opportunities. Looking at the table 7 the model FP seems to be the most appropriate because it shows the best proportion among main uses and diversity of main uses corresponds to various wishes of the farmers and their better move in local markets (they can gain more benefits).

Chapter References (in the study named Bibliography): Individual items must be arranged in alphabetical order.

 

 

Author Response

Hello dear reviewer,
While we thank you for your comments, we are sending you a file of our responses as an attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

This is a resubmission of a manuscript that I reviewed a few weeks ago. While some improvements were indeed made to the manuscript, the authors seem to have largely ignored most of my suggestions unfortunately.

My first general comment that I made from the previous round of review was that the introduction section was overly long and full of repetitive information. Instead of addressing or even acknowledging this, the authors seem to have completely ignored my point, and instead state that they ADDED a paragraph to the introduction. This is frustrating.

I also provided a very important comment regarding the results associated with figure 4. I stated that the conclusions that the authors make with figure 4 cannot be valid without comparing the results to proper controls. I clearly stated in my previous review that this was a serious comment, and that the results of the paper hinge upon addressing it. Unfortunately, the authors again seem to completely ignore my comment, and provide no indication that they addresed or even examined the problem. They also provide no additional analyses that I requested. Here is my original comment and their response:

My Comment: “Figure 4 shows the relationship between the density of cocoa-associated plants and overall species richness. This is a core result of the manuscript and one the authors use to support the hypothesis that forest diversity is promoted by cocoa-associated forest species. This is fine, except that the authors do not produce additional relationships showing no or weaker relationships with non-cocoa-assocaited species. This is very important to do, and the exclusion of these analyses puts the results and conclusions into serious question. There is a well-known relationship between stem density and diversity, so the relationship the authors show in figure 4 is not exactly surprising. The authors must show that this relationship is stronger for cocoa-assocaited species than it is for non-cocoa associated species and for all species combined.”

Authors Response: “Response: we thank the reviewer for his comment on this relationship between density and species richness. We thank the reviewer to recognize the importance of this finding. Our study is done here on plants associated to cocoa. This is the focus of this study. We also provide references to studies that find the same relationship”

Next, I had a comment regarding cities other than Kisangani, and asked the authors to address how these other cities may influence their results. Specifically, the authors use distance from Kisangani as a predictor variable, but they ignore the influence of any other city in the region. The authors do not provide any explanation for why this should not be a concern. They simply acknowledge that another city (Tshopo) exists in the area. Again, this is inadequate and is very frustrating.

This general problem continues on throughout the entire response to reviews document. The authors do not seem to take any of my previous comments seriously, and they give very short and canned responses. Usually, they just thank me for my comment, and do not explain how they responded. They did not respond to any of my specific line comments!!!

Ultimately, I found the authors responses to my previous comments entirely inadequate. I find this highly frustrating and disappointing, especially since I originally thought this was an interesting paper that could easily be suitable for this journal if my my previous comments were adequately addressed. It appears to me though that I spent more time reviewing the paper than the authors did addressing my comments.

When I recommend ‘Major Revisions’ for a manuscript, as I did previously, the expectation is that the authors will spend a considerable amount of time and effort improving the manuscript in order for it to be publishable. In no way does this recommendation imply that the manuscript should be accepted after minimal edits. Unfortunately, the authors have not convinced me at all that this manuscript is suitable for publication at this journal.

 

Author Response

Hello dear reviewer,
We thank you very much for your comments in order to improve the quality of our manuscript. Please find attached our responses to the comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

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

This is an interesting and timely paper and made an interesting read. I have a few main areas of concern about this manuscript:

• Generally throughout, I think the structure can be greatly improved. At the moment it is a bit hard to follow in places, so I would make sure you are stating your objectives clearly, and then showing how you address each one. The structure in the discussion is particularly confusing as you keep most of the same headings as in the results section but miss out certain sections e.g. 3.2 and 3.4. However I don’t think you should try and keep the structure the same in the discussion- this is where you need to bring everything together as opposed to discussing each section separately.
• The content could be much better presented. At the moment the results section has a lot of tables and is quite difficult to understand why certain statistical tests are used and not others. Furthermore, there is possibly too much content and some graphs don’t really add much to the manuscript e.g. the dendrograms. I would think about your what you are trying to show and focus on those results, maybe moving some of the larger tables to an appendix.
• I think the content could also be better explained. There is a lack of detail most importantly in the introduction and methods sections. However, the discussion also reads as an extended description of the results as opposed to explaining why you have found certain results.

I also have some more specific feedback on each section which I have indicated where possibly in the attached edited manuscript:

Introduction: This section is fairly short and I think could benefit from more detail and more references to better frame the research carried out. I would consider adding the objectives at the end of the introduction and basing the structure of the methods and results sections around how you meet these objectives.

Methods: I would suggest revising the figure of the study location as it is slightly confusing to the reader. It might also be beneficial to add a zoomed in figure showing the locations of plots as, if they are on the current one, they are not visible. It is also not clear which is the road along which this research took place.

I think extra detail is also warranted in the methods section, especially for the indices used as it isn’t clear what each one does, why they were chosen and how they are different. It could be beneficial as well to revise the structure of the methodology or add subheadings for each objective and how they are met.

Results: The structure of the results section is good, however there are far too many tables which makes it a confusing read. I would suggest trying to create figures to replace some of the tables, moving some of them to an appendix or restructuring them to make them easier to read. For example, in the table with the list of species, it is unclear what species are (a) shade species (b) forest species or (c) oil palm species. It is also unclear throughout what ‘shade species’ refers to- is this all species? Or just forest or oil palm? I would also consider removing results which don’t add to what you are trying to show.

The stats are confusing as well- I’m not sure that some of the tests are appropriate to use for example Wilcoxon- results are not paired so this shouldn’t be used here. You only need to mention tests you use, so giving a long list of statistical tests at the start and then not using them is confusing. I suggest the author rethinks what they want to show and focus on these results. You also need to double check the table/figure numbers, add sufficient detail to each of the legends as if they stand alone and explain any acronyms before they are used.

Discussion: I think this section possibly needs the most work with more detailed, referenced arguments for why you found the results you show, not just what you found. There are several sections which are almost entirely a description of the results-this should go in the results section or be removed.

Be consistent in your terminology and define the phrases you are using e.g. shade species is undefined and is unclear what this refers to. You also talk about introduced species in the discussion, but it isn’t clear if this is referring to cocoa or oil palms or something else. You also use latin names with no reference to what type of species they are or how they are used. Stating the latin names won’t mean anything to the reader without having to go and look them up!

In general I think there need to be more references to support your arguments in the discussion as they are currently relatively sparse. There also needs to be more explanation behind why you found these results as currently, the discussion is mainly descriptive. I would also restructure it- I don’t think you need a sub heading for each set of results in the discussion- think of ways to tie together your arguments across the different sections or focus on the most significant results instead of describing all of them. So I would suggest you think about what you main messages are and how best to portray them. The last section (4.6) is a better reflection of what should be in the discussion, so I would suggest expanding on this and talking in more detail about the various projects that have or could be implemented.

Conclusion: This section seems to be a bit of a jump from the discussion. You refer to, for example, edaphic factors as being the main determinant of species diversity, yet they haven’t previously been mentioned at all. So I would revise your discussion to make sure your conclusions are properly supported e.g. what do the different model options offer for conservation? Why are introduced species different in different areas? How is cocoa agroforest one of the main tools for conservation?

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 1 Comments

 

 

Point 1: (Introduction) This section is fairly short and I think could benefit from more detail and more references to better frame the research carried out. I would consider adding the objectives at the end of the introduction and basing the structure of the methods and results sections around how you meet these objectives.


 

Response 1: The section has been well detailed in the new version with more references. Also, we added the objectives at the end of the introduction, based on the structure of the methods and results, as you recommended.

 

Point 2: (Methods) I would suggest revising the figure of the study location as it is slightly confusing to the reader. It might also be beneficial to add a zoomed in figure showing the locations of plots as, if they are on the current one, they are not visible. It is also not clear which is the road along which this research took place.

 

I think extra detail is also warranted in the methods section, especially for the indices used as it isn’t clear what each one does, why they were chosen and how they are different. It could be beneficial as well to revise the structure of the methodology or add subheadings for each objective and how they are met.

 

Response 2: The figure of the study location is revised in the new version of manuscript with more details and a zoom on plots location as you requested.

 

The methods are now structured in sections with several details for each index.

 

 

Point 3: (Results) The structure of the results section is good, however there are far too many tables which makes it a confusing read. I would suggest trying to create figures to replace some of the tables, moving some of them to an appendix or restructuring them to make them easier to read. For example, in the table with the list of species, it is unclear what species are (a) shade species (b) forest species or (c) oil palm species. It is also unclear throughout what ‘shade species’ refers to- is this all species? Or just forest or oil palm? I would also consider removing results which don’t add to what you are trying to show.

 

The stats are confusing as well- I’m not sure that some of the tests are appropriate to use for example Wilcoxon- results are not paired so this shouldn’t be used here. You only need to mention tests you use, so giving a long list of statistical tests at the start and then not using them is confusing. I suggest the author rethinks what they want to show and focus on these results. You also need to double check the table/figure numbers, add sufficient detail to each of the legends as if they stand alone and explain any acronyms before they are used.

 

Response 3: We have replaced some tables (Table 2, Table 4, Table 5, Table 6 and Table 7) from the old version with figures (respectively Figure 2, Figure 3, Figure 4, Figure 6 and Figure 7) in the new version. These provide a good understanding of the information provided.

Figures that do not provide important information, such as Figure 4 and Figure 5, have been deleted.

 

Only the statics used appear in the new version. Others have been removed.

 

Point 4: (Discussion) I think this section possibly needs the most work with more detailed, referenced arguments for why you found the results you show, not just what you found. There are several sections which are almost entirely a description of the results-this should go in the results section or be removed.

 

Be consistent in your terminology and define the phrases you are using e.g. shade species is undefined and is unclear what this refers to. You also talk about introduced species in the discussion, but it isn’t clear if this is referring to cocoa or oil palms or something else. You also use latin names with no reference to what type of species they are or how they are used. Stating the latin names won’t mean anything to the reader without having to go and look them up!

 

In general I think there need to be more references to support your arguments in the discussion as they are currently relatively sparse. There also needs to be more explanation behind why you found these results as currently, the discussion is mainly descriptive. I would also restructure it- I don’t think you need a sub heading for each set of results in the discussion- think of ways to tie together your arguments across the different sections or focus on the most significant results instead of describing all of them. So I would suggest you think about what you main messages are and how best to portray them. The last section (4.6) is a better reflection of what should be in the discussion, so I would suggest expanding on this and talking in more detail about the various projects that have or could be implemented.

 

Response 4: In the new version of the discussion, it is more about explaining our results. Compare them with other work and explain why we found similar or different results from other studies. We have removed the description of the results from this section.

 

We have described the different species of trees. We have also given their common names so that readers can understand them, as you recommended.

 

Point 5: (Conclusion) This section seems to be a bit of a jump from the discussion. You refer to, for example, edaphic factors as being the main determinant of species diversity, yet they haven’t previously been mentioned at all. So, I would revise your discussion to make sure your conclusions are properly supported e.g. what do the different model options offer for conservation? Why are introduced species different in different areas? How is cocoa agroforest one of the main tools for conservation?

 

Response 5:

Now let's think that the conclusion is easier to understand than in the previous version.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Agroforestry systems are increasingly gaining importance in science and practice as they can contribute to sustainable land use and can be a measure against further deforestation and land degradation. Thus, the study “Species diversity in the cocoa agroforests of the Bengamisa-Yangambi Forest Landscape in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)” is generally of high interest, also because it addresses a study region not well studied so far with regard to the specific subject. However, in the current form the manuscript does not meet a high standard of publication for an international community. Many details which should have been explained are missing (see below). The structure of the manuscript is confusing, also because clear hypotheses are not stated. I recommend to completely re-work the manuscript and re-submit it. Additionally, the English language definitely needs revision.

As follows, some comments are stated for the different sections of the paper:

Introduction

• Start introduction with a general/global view on agroforestry systems which gain increasingly interest. In general, agroforestry systems can contribute to sustainability, not only cocoa systems
• The introduction is a bit confusing: first you describe the positive affects than you outline the “poor” farming systems which are economically not stable; please, clarify
• Cocoa farming can also be very intense and not sustainable – there are always “two sides of the coin”
• Please, address other potential ecosystem services, cocoa farming systems can provide
• The research question is too vague; please state clear hypotheses, also against the above-mentioned divergence between positive and negative effects of cocoa farming systems

 

Study area and methods

• Please, give more information on the abiotic (e.g. climate, soil) and biotic (e.g. vegetation) as well as socio-economic conditions (e.g. economic conditions, agricultural situation) of the study area
• What means “highly degraded”?
• Please, specify better the “zones”
• Why the study sites were selected “along the main road”?
• Please, be more specific with figure and table captions, e.g. Fig. 1 shows also the study plots
• Please, delete chapter “equipment” and integrate into chapter “data collection”
• Why the different plot size: 625 m² or 2,500 m²?
• How did you sample the vegetation? All vascular plants? Frequency and abundance? Differentiation in vegetation layers? The sampling should follow an internationally accepted standard procedure.
• Please, state a Table where you provide data on the various agroforestry systems you investigated, including agricultural management.
• Why the cocoa trees were measured? Please, explain how this approach is related to the diversity study?

 

Results

• As no clear hypotheses were formulated in the introduction, the result section seems a bit confusing.
• It is ok to state the most abundant plant species (Table 1). However, for biodiversity assessments, it is crucial to know more about the rare species which might have high significance for species conservation.
• Why the species in Table 2 are “harmful”? Seems to be an issue for the discussion.
• Please, always refer in the text to the specific fig. numbers.
• 6: what means “wealth”?

 

Discussion

• The first part of the discussion is just a repetition of the results.
• I recommend a Table where you compare results from other studies with your own.
• The difference of species richness along the gradient of distance from the city might have socio-economic reasons (cp. the “Rings of Thünen”)
• Also the discussion seems confusing as no clear hypotheses were formulated in advance.

 

 

 

 

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 2 Comments

 

 

Point 1: (Introduction)

• Start introduction with a general/global view on agroforestry systems which gain increasingly interest. In general, agroforestry systems can contribute to sustainability, not only cocoa systems
• Cocoa farming can also be very intense and not sustainable – there are always “two sides of the coin”
• Please, address other potential ecosystem services, cocoa farming systems can provide
• The research question is too vague; please state clear hypotheses, also against the above-mentioned divergence between positive and negative effects of cocoa farming systems

 

Response 1:

• In the new version of manuscript, we started the introduction with a general idea about agroforestry, giving their importance and interests , as you requested
• The positive and negative impacts of cocoa agroforestry are clearly explained in the new version.
• Other potential ecosystem services that cocoa farming systems can provide are givin in the new version
• Hypotheses are now clear in the introduction

 

Point 2: (Study area and methods)

• Please, give more information on the abiotic (e.g. climate, soil) and biotic (e.g. vegetation) as well as socio-economic conditions (e.g. economic conditions, agricultural situation) of the study area
• What means “highly degraded”?
• We wanted to say more degraded
•  
• Why the study sites were selected “along the main road”?
• Because in our study landscape, the villages are located along the main road and the cocoa farms are not far from villages.
•  
• Please, delete chapter “equipment” and integrate into chapter “data collection”
• Already taken in consideration in the new version
•  
• Why the different plot size: 625 m² or 2,500 m²?
• Each plot was 25 x 25 m (625 m²). We have established 4 plots in each cocoa agroforest. The total area of 4 plots corresponds to 2500 m² per agroforest.
• How did you sample the vegetation? All vascular plants? Frequency and abundance? Differentiation in vegetation layers? The sampling should follow an internationally accepted standard procedure.
• We were not interested in all vascular plants, only trees. So, we did a full inventory. This type of inventory identifies and measures all tree species in the plot.
•  
• Why the cocoa trees were measured? Please, explain how this approach is related to the diversity study?

 

Cocoa trees were measured here to calculate the average basal area of each agroforest.

 

 

Response 2:

• The study area is well detailed in the new version with information on the abiotic (e.g. climate, soil) and biotic (e.g. vegetation) as well as socio-economic conditions (e.g. economic conditions, agricultural situation)
• The different zones are well specified
• The figure of the study location is revised in the new version of manuscript with more details and a zoom on plots location for better understanding.
• The section “equipment” is already deleted.
• Table 1 in the new version provides data on the various agroforestry systems and agricultural management
•  

Point 3: (Results)

• As no clear hypotheses were formulated in the introduction, the result section seems a bit confusing.
• It is ok to state the most abundant plant species (Table 1). However, for biodiversity assessments, it is crucial to know more about the rare species which might have high significance for species conservation.

Response 3:

• In the new version, hypotheses are clear in the introduction as well as the result section
• Abundant and rare species are represented in the section 3.3.
• All figures are referred in the text

•  
• Why the species in Table 2 are “harmful”? Seems to be an issue for the discussion.
•  
• Please, always refer in the text to the specific fig. numbers.
•  
• 6: what means “wealth”?

We wanted to say richness

 

Point 4: (Discussion)

• The first part of the discussion is just a repetition of the results.
• The difference of species richness along the gradient of distance from the city might have socio-economic reasons (cp. the “Rings of Thünen”)
• Also the discussion seems confusing as no clear hypotheses were formulated in advance.

 

Response 4:

• In the new version of the discussion, it is more about explaining our results. Compare them with other work and explain why we found similar or different results from other studies. We have removed the description of the results from this section.
• Socio-economic reasons on difference of species richness along the gradient of distance from the city are provided in the new manuscript version
• As hypotheses are now clear in the introduction, discussion is also clear

 

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Unfortunately, many of the points raised in the first review are not considered sufficiently in the revision. The manuscript is still a bit confusing.

Also, the English has still some considerable flaws.