Impact of Climate Change on Informal Street Vendors: A Systematic Review to Help South Africa and Other Nations (2015–2024)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Review Assessing the Impact of Climate Change on Informal Street Vendors in South Africa: A Systematic Review with Comparative Analysis (2015-2024)

This study explored the impact of climate change on health and economic stability of street vendors in South Africa, Asia, North America, and South America and revealed solutions that could be implemented immediately by governments and street vendors.

Title: The title indicates that a systematic review was conducted that involved studies from South Africa.  Comparative analysis was also conducted but, with only the mention of South Africa, the conclusion would be that the comparative analysis was only among the studies conducted in South Africa.  The detailed analysis offers more insights than those from South Africa and many of the solutions in the other countries could be implemented in South Africa. Therefore, the emphasis can stay on South Africa but the lessons would come from the variety of countries.  Consider this title, “Impact of Climate Change on Informal Street Vendors in South Africa, India and Developing Countries:  A systematic review to help South Africa and other nations (2015-2024)”

Abstract: The last part of the background should have the text changed that now reads, “while drawing comparisons with other regions globally.”  In reading the full study, comparisons were not drawn but instead lessons were revealed from the majority of the studies that were conducted in South Africa, India, and developing countries.  Under Methods, the author could write that this study intended to “explore if solutions might present themselves.” The author did more than conduct a comparative analysis because that would suggest that one country was deemed superior to another.  Instead, the author revealed innovations that governments could apply in their own countries to help their street vendors and that the street vendors could implement.  These were more than “adaptation strategies” and included leveraging social networks and implementing mobile payment or cooling devices. There are insights throughout the article that need to be showcased. With climate change being catastrophic, this study needs to reveal what can be shared immediately to help all the street vendors in all the countries.  More studies can be done but this study was exhaustive and the author has the information in the text.  The last sentences in the conclusion can be eliminated and replaced with detailed lessons, similar to the recommendations on lines 774 to 795.  The world needs more than academic generalities now in those last sentences. Try reading that text and imagining the opposite. Would anyone really want to implement an intervention that was ill-tailored? Would any government want to admit that they were going to promote policies that were exclusive? Would any government want to propose policies that did not enhance an adaptive capacity with climate change being so dire?  All academics would like to see longitudinal studies to understand regional variations. They would not want to have non-targeted interventions.  The text on lines 774 to 795 can be condensed but expanded with more details (see below). The author has a good study and just needs to rework the wording.

Introduction:  The Introduction has many paragraphs with sentences that are repeats. The readers only need to read once that street vendors are exposed to heat waves, floods, storms, air pollution, and drought.  Those are all problems with climate change and the only one that can be fixed with small scale technology is the mobile source air pollution (replace internal combustion vehicles with EVs).  Mention is made of adaptation strategies and resilience-building, but this puts the burden on the individual street vendor. They could “adapt” by wearing a mask to lessen exposure to mobile source air pollution or be more resilient by baking in the middle of the night and selling their wares at 7 AM.

Research Aim: The research aim really was not to identify the adaptation strategies (#3) in informal street vendors in South Africa because that relies on individual initiative. Instead, this study looked at South Africa, India, and developing nations through a systematic review to identify solutions that could be implemented by all individual vendors, groups of vendors, and governments to improve the quality of life of street vendors in the face of climate change.  

Results: The results (lines 247-254) show that this study was about far more than the street vendors in South Africa.

In reading through all the results, mention is made often of the negative impacts (lines 293-314).  On the themes chart, the majority of the categories are about the negative impacts from climate change. These impacts are well known and documented. What is necessary is to reveal the solutions. Lines 363-364 revealed the problems (pollution, heat stress, weather, decreased footfall).  It is not possible to fix the weather but there are small elements that are mentioned. 

Solutions – Lines 385 to 386 mention tarps and shade structures.  Line  450 mentioned traffic-related air pollution but some streets could be restricted only for EVs. EVs car are expensive but an E bike (scooter) is affordable. Streets limited to EVs would help drive the sale of EVs.  Lack of clean water and sanitation facilities were health risks but, unlike fixing climate change, those are doable.  By street vendors, a city could provide indoor bathroom stalls with large long sinks for washing dishes and vegetables.  The excess water could be directed to water street trees planted along a vendor street.  Streets would be designed to serve the vendors. 

On line 483, mention is made of the need for caregiving.  A vendor street could have a day care center at one end of the street that would be near the bathrooms, long washing sink, and shade.

Droughts were identified (line 502) and water for washing was necessary.  Menion was also made about the need for caring for children 510.

Informal savings groups were mentioned on line 608. Diversifying goods was mentioned on line 708. Relocation to safer and more profitable locations was mentioned line 710.   Moving to safer areas during extreme weather was on line 732 and having digital payment systems and cooling devices was on line 734.    

The recommendations on lines 774 to 795 should summarize all of the solutions found in the text above.

The Results section needs to be divided into sections that show the concerns for climate negatives (flooding, heat, pollution exposure, etc. – this text can be condensed because everyone already knows the problems.). A second and dominant section should not just be on adaptation but on the implementable solutions governments could now put in place and individual vendors could try. 

The future should be to encourage governments to pilot the solutions found in the 48 studies and publish the findings and for individual vendors to come together and lobby for these changes and put in place solutions that serve their needs.

 

Author Response

Good Day,  Please find attached report

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

GENERAL OPINION:

The topic is important and the research is properly carried out. However, the analysis is in some conflict with the title of the manuscript. The analysis deals with Asia, America and Africa together, without focusing on South Africa. Either the focus of the analysis should be more focused to South Africa, or the title of the paper should be made more general. There are some minor problems with the presentation of the manuscript, which should be corrected. See details below.

 

DETAILS:

Abstract: the content of the abstract is good, but the words: „Background, Methods, Results, Conclusions” should be omitted. The results should be limited to South Africa, in line with the title of the paper.

 

Keywords: 11 keywords are a bit too much. Please choose less  and more relevant keywords.

 

Introduction:

·        This section gives a good background for the research. However, a brief paragraph should be included to describe the main climate change features in South Africa, for the 2015-2024 period. Similarly, some basic information about the economic role of informal street vendors in South Africa should be briefly presented, possibly with some background figures.

·        The introduction should contain a brief literature review about similar systematic analyses about climate impacts, and methodology-related surveys, to support your idea of such analysis leading to relevant and reliable results.

·        Line 112: the sentence should be deleted.

 

Materials and Methods:

·        The methodology is properly explained.

·        However, as the title of the paper refers to South Africa, it would be useful to know how many of the reviewed publications deals with South Africa. What proportion of the the finally chosen 48 documents deal with South Africa, climate change and internal street vendors?  As the title of the paper refers to these issues, a significant number of documents should be related to all these issues to make a relevant analysis. According to Table S1, and Fig 1, only 12 documents deal with South Africa. Why do you consider this a sufficient number regarding the title of the paper?

 

Results:

·        The whole Results section deals with the 48 papers together, without geographic segmentation. regarding the analysis, the authors do not focus on South Africa, in spite of the title of the paper. This should be corrected – either by changing the title, or re-analysing the documents with a South-African focus.

·        Fig1: the legend should be „America, Asia, Africa” and not „America, Asia, African”.

·        Line 277-278, and Fig 2:The sentence  „A period of significant growth occurred between 2021 and 2024, with 25 studies (52%) published during these four years” is somewhat misleading. Looking at Fig 2, it is obvious that only one year (2023) stands out, the other years represent only 4-5 studies per year.

·        Line 283-284: „This increasing trend demonstrates the growing urgency to address the challenges faced by informal street vendors due to climate change.” – There is no obvious increasing trend, but only an extreme year, 2023. You should consider this fact, when explaining and interpreting the results.

·        Fig 3: Following the title of the paper, the main themes of the publications should be also broken down by countries, to see how many of them deal with South Africa.

·        Fig 4: This figure, though very nice in a popular paper, does not contain scientific data. The keywords should rather be presented in a table, with exact frequency data, instead of the colours and word letter sizes.

·        Fig 5- Fig 10: What is the measurement unit in these figures? Number of mentions of the specific terms, or something else? Please specify it for each figure.

·        Line 568: 3.5 Regional Differences  - This is the first point of the manuscript, when the authors intend to deal with differences between South Africa and other regions. However, the main theme presented in Table 2 still does not contain any regional aspect. The section itself does not focus on South Africa.

·        Line 626: Gap Analysis should be numbered 3.6, and not 3.4 again.

 

Discussions:

The authors try to answer the main research questions in the South African context. However, their statements may be true only for the whole sample, and not for South Africa specifically. The low number of documents dealing with South Africa, and the geographically not segmented analysis does not justify any such statements about South Africa. The authors should re-consider the title and the focus of their analysis accordingly.

 

Conclusions:

You have a section 5. Conclusions (line  744) and a 6. Conclusions (line 815) section. You should merge the two, and again, re-consider its focus regarding the geographical/regional relevance of your results. The limitations of the research should also take into account the relatively low number of relevant documents analysed.

 

References:

You list 52 references, and these include the 48 papers analysed in the manuscript.  As it was mentioned about the Introduction section,  some references should be included about similar systematic analyses dealing with climate impact analyses, and other methodology-related surveys, to support your idea, that  such analysis can lead to relevant and reliable results.

 

Author Response

Good Day. Find Attached report

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Second Review: Impact of Climate Change on Informal Street Vendors: A Systematic Revies to Help South Africa and Other Nations (2015-2024)

The authors have greatly improved the article but changes still are recommended.

Title: The title is now ideal, especially as it includes the words “to ‘Help’ South Africa and Other Nations.”

Abstract: Many only read the abstract and don’t bother to read the full article.  Many others never make it to the end of an article to read recommendations for the future.  This reviewer had suggested that the authors delete the last sentences in the abstract and replace those lines with the recommendations at the end of the article.  There is no text on the authors’ response sheet to indicate that this was done.

   Now, the revised manuscript again gives text at the end of the Abstract that adds no substantive information to, as the title reads, “’Help’ South Africa and Other Nations.  If those sentences in the end of the abstract were rewritten with the negative, here is that meaning. Would anyone really do an “untailored intervention.” Would a policy maker really promote “exclusive policies that do not enhance adaptive capacity.”  “Everyone says that more research is needed” so that sentence, also, does not provide information to the reader, especially a reader who is only reading the abstract.  Climate change is catastrophic and the authors have phenomenal suggestions of “help” in sections from lines 994 to 1063. The authors also suggest on lines 1062-1063 that communities “pilot the solutions found in the 48 studies and publish the findings.” How can the communities pilot the authors’ terrific findings if the authors’ findings are only found at the end of the article?  It is not enough to mention in the abstract on line 32 that Asian vendors have solutions including mobile payment systems and cooling devices. The wonderful street vendors in South Africa most likely do not have access to mobile payment systems or cooling devices.  That finding was in citation  #38 now #39 and in the Fangshan District in Beijing, China.  Vendors in Beijing would have access to affordable mobile payment systems (and the internet and easily re-chargable devices to stream the information) and to be able to buy from a range of new cooling devices.  These options are not available to street vendors in South Africa who would not have the means to purchase such items or have the devices available. The same could be written about many of the other vendors in countries similar to South Africa.

On a very small point, on lines 112, and 114, the authors should include the worlds “governments.”  “…it is crucial to understand how informal street vendors are affected and what adaptation strategies they and ‘governments’ can employ.”  The burden for change cannot all fall on the vendors.

Introduction: On lines 112-114, the authors write, “Given the significant risks posed by climate change and air pollution, it is crucial to understand how informal vendors are affected and ‘what adaptation strategies they employ.’ ”  The article tends to focus on the negatives of how the vendors are impacted and less on the adaptation strategies they employ.  The world, and these vendors especially, need the solutions the authors have revealed and outlined in lines 994 to 1062.  The authors can think in terms of “pilots” when they rewrite the last sentences in the Abstract.  What could the governments and vendors test as pilots to show what will (remember the article’s title) “Help.” The key information is at the end of this rich and informative article and should be in the Abstract.

Author Response

Good Day. Find attached report

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The authors properly handled all my comments and suggestions. I consider the paper suitable for publication.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your positive feedback and for considering my paper suitable for publication. I appreciate your time and effort in reviewing my manuscript and providing valuable comments and suggestions. Your insights have significantly contributed to improving the quality of my work.