Evaluation of Citriculture Mechanisation Level in Valencia Region (Spain): Poll Results

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript is written well and it targets an essential aspect of agricultural mechanisation as improving profitability in citrus production in the Mediterranean region. The literature review seems adequate to me and the concept was decently presented although it could be supported with further information. In general, I have no additional comments.

Author Response

- Thank you very much for your comments on our manuscript. 

Reviewer 2 Report

General comments

The submitted article concerns the level of mechanization in citrus cultivation in the Valencia region (Spain) and its impact on the profitability of production. The publication is based on questionnaires addressed to farms, divided according to the crop area. The scope of the cited literature, work methodology, statistical tools and conclusions raise no objections. The publication is a valuable contribution to research on the economics of agriculture and the impact of mechanization on the profitability of fruit production, where certain stages of production, especially tree cutting and the harvesting of table fruits, are difficult to mechanize. The conclusions contained in the study confirm the general belief that better prospects (optimism) and profitability of production are characteristic of larger farms with a higher degree of mechanization, managed by young farmers.

Detailed comments

Figure 1 and Figure 2. “Std desviation” or rather : „std deviation”?

Author Response

- Thank you very much for your comments on our manuscript. 

Reviewer 3 Report

This is a relatively simple manuscript based on a questionnaire survey. I am not sure if the manuscript thematically falls into the scope of Agronomy scientific journal. From my point of view, this is more of a socio-economic study that would be better suited to a similarly based journal.

The introduction is very short and only 10 references are very few. Discussion with the results found by other authors is missing.

For the above reasons, I think that the submitted manuscript does not reach such a scientific level that it can be published in the scientific journal Agronomy.

Author Response

Reviewer 3

This is a relatively simple manuscript based on a questionnaire survey. I am not sure if the manuscript thematically falls into the scope of Agronomy scientific journal. From my point of view, this is more of a socio-economic study that would be better suited to a similarly based journal.

- Thank you for your comment. We agreed that the manuscript is related to socio-economic aspects of citrus orchards. However, this is directly based on citrus mechanization. The three types of questionnaires have been designed after the extensively experience of the authors in the field of citrus orchards mechanization. The objective and results of the study are destined to complement the research line about citrus orchard mechanization. The research work has been developed and  funded in the context of a research project about citrus technology and advances in citrus crop mechanization (This research has been funded by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development and cofounded by the Ministerio de Agricultura, Pesca y Alimentación (project GO “Avances tecnológicos para la modernización y la sostenibilidad en la producción de cítricos CITRUSTECH”)

The introduction is very short and only 10 references are very few. Discussion with the results found by other authors is missing.

- Thank you for the suggestion. More references have been added in the introduction (references [1], [9], [10], [11] and [12], new lines 17-18; 25-28) and a discussion (references [16] and [17]) of the result section have been added (references [16] and [17], new lines 108-123).

For the above, I think that the submitted manuscript does not reach such a scientific level that it can be published in the scientific journal Agronomy.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 3 Report

Article was improved. However, I generally do not like similar contributions based on the evaluation of questionnaires. I'm still not sure if this contribution reaches the level to be published in the scientific journal Agronomy. Nevertheless, of course, I leave the final decision to the editors.