Reducing Phosphorus Input into the Baltic Sea—An Assessment of the Updated Baltic Sea Action Plan and Its Implementation through the Common Agricultural Policy in Germany
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Author,
Thank you for your work. It is difficult to research the connections from different standards, laws and other bureaucratic documents. That's why I think that you need to define a clear methodology with a focus on phosphorus sources and the way in which the effectiveness of measures to reduce phosphorus intake is evaluated.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
thank you for taking the time to review the manuscript. I agree that researching policy instruments is challenging. The qualitative governance applied in this article assesses different instruments against (legally-binding) policy goals while e.g., taking governance issues such as shifting problems into consideration. In response to your suggestions, I have – amongst others – revised Section 2 ‘Materials and Methods’.
Please find further responses to your comments in the PDF.
Kind regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The topic is an important one, and I don't disagree with what is presented. However, the paper offers little by way of new insights. Reference to 'qualitative governance analysis' in the Abstract had me hoping for some original primary research (e.g., stakeholder interviews) and suggestions for ways forward. Instead all I got was a rehash of relatively well known issues and problems drawn from existing literature. Disappointing.
Separately, although readable, the use of English could be improved to make the paper both shorter and crisper.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
thank you for taking the time to review the manuscript.
The manuscript presents novel insights into the updated Baltic Sea Action Plan and its implementation through the new CAP in Germany. There has not been any research on this topic before. I understand that all research methods come with different strengths and weaknesses. The method adopted in this manuscript allows for e.g., an in-depth investigation of policy and legal documents against (legally-binding) policy goals and the consideration of potential governance issues.
In response to your remark of lacking suggestions for ways forward, I have added policy proposals (reforming the EU ETS and implementing an emissions trading scheme for the livestock sector) at the end of the manuscript. Aside from that, I went through the manuscript to improve the language.
Kind regards
Reviewer 3 Report
Date Dec 14,2022
Title: Reducing Phosphorus Input into the Baltic Sea: An Assessment of the Updated Baltic Sea Action Plan and its Implementation through the Common Agricultural Policy in Germany
Review comments:
Abstract
What is the specific objective of the paper? It starts by mentioning the method rather than framing the objective of the research. Are you assessing the whole document, or do you just want to emphasize a specific attainable research question? It should be more scientific otherwise; it will be just reviewing a document or action plan.
Line 17: Phosphorus serves as an example.
Already mentioned at the start of the abstract need of repeating it.
These shortcomings are supplemented weaknesses of the updated Baltic Sea Action Plan’s actions themselves? What does it mean? this sentence is unclear.
Expected to see some perspectives on the use of the findings?
Key words: better to arrange in chronological order and also concise.
For example. Baltic Sea; updated Baltic Sea Action Plan
It is already the Baltic Sea action plan is enough…no need of writing Baltic Sea…please make it concise accordingly.
Introduction
Paragraph 3, with regards to previous studies:
What did they get or put forward in their findings? their findings should be discussed in linking to your objectives.
This research gap needs to be rephrased in a more scientific way.
However, no study has so far covered the updated BSAP and specifically assessed the extent to which the CAP contributes to the objective of the Helsinki Convention through the implementation of actions established in the updated BSA
Some comments are included in the manuscript, please go through.
Introduction part needs a strong revision.
Material and methods
The method part lacks a string method application and it so shallow.
Some comments are included in the text.
Results
Section 3.1
It is just a mere discussion of the document. No scientific approach to point out the authors insight?
Discussion’s part
· The discussion part is somehow repeating some of the texts from the result part.
· It is should be rephrased and revised. The discussion part must be what is studied in the paper does not to include general concept without linking the results.
· The authors should link the results with the discussion part rather than discussing the action plan documents(it should very specific with Phosphorous related aspects)
Conclusion
Needs a slight change
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
thank you for taking the time to review the manuscript. Below, please find responses to your suggestions. Further revisions and responses to your comments can be found in the PDF.
Kind regards
Abstract
What is the specific objective of the paper? It starts by mentioning the method rather than framing the objective of the research. Are you assessing the whole document, or do you just want to emphasize a specific attainable research question? It should be more scientific otherwise; it will be just reviewing a document or action plan.
I have revised the abstract accordingly.
Line 17: Phosphorus serves as an example.
Already mentioned at the start of the abstract need of repeating it.
I have removed the sentence.
These shortcomings are supplemented weaknesses of the updated Baltic Sea Action Plan’s actions themselves? What does it mean? this sentence is unclear.
I have revised the sentence.
Expected to see some perspectives on the use of the findings?
This is – what I believe you are referring to – subsumed under the sentence ‘Therefore, effective other policy instruments at the EU level are needed.’ Further elaborations were not possible due to the word limit of the abstract.
Key words: better to arrange in chronological order and also concise.
For example. Baltic Sea; updated Baltic Sea Action Plan
It is already the Baltic Sea action plan is enough…no need of writing Baltic Sea…please make it concise accordingly.
I have removed the key word ‘Baltic Sea’. Besides that, the key words are listed along their prominence.
Introduction
Paragraph 3, with regards to previous studies:
What did they get or put forward in their findings? their findings should be discussed in linking to your objectives.
The objective of introducing previous studies in the introduction was not to link their findings to the objective of this study but to highlight that no study has so far covered the topic of this article.
This research gap needs to be rephrased in a more scientific way.
However, no study has so far covered the updated BSAP and specifically assessed the extent to which the CAP contributes to the objective of the Helsinki Convention through the implementation of actions established in the updated BSA
Some comments are included in the manuscript, please go through.
Introduction part needs a strong revision.
I have revised this sentence.
Material and methods
The method part lacks a string method application and it so shallow.
Some comments are included in the text.
I have revised this section by e.g., amending the figure which had an error, including a description of the study area, specifying the literature search and adding further details to the method description.
Results
Section 3.1
It is just a mere discussion of the document. No scientific approach to point out the authors insight?
I have now included insights into this Section.
Discussion’s part
- The discussion part is somehow repeating some of the texts from the result part.
- It is should be rephrased and revised. The discussion part must be what is studied in the paper does not to include general concept without linking the results.
- The authors should link the results with the discussion part rather than discussing the action plan documents(it should very specific with Phosphorous related aspects)
I have comprehensively revised the results section and the discussion. In particular, I have removed repetitions such as references to the buffer strip width and moved content from the discussion to the results. This includes for example funding changes of the new CAP and details about the actions in the updated BSAP (weak imperatives). The results are now denser and the discussion better links with the results – also because I have inserted references to the corresponding sections.
Conclusion
Needs a slight change
Please see PDF for amendments in the conclusions.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Author,
Attached you can find few concerns still related to the methodology which is still unclear or too general.
Best regards
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you again for your feedback.
Please find responses to your comments in the attached document.
Kind regards
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
I thank the author for her revisions. Although I remain unconvinced of the originality of the paper, because my fellow reviewers are more relaxed I will not reject it again - but request that some text is added (key phrases in bold below).
Given that the technical remedies to pollutant loadings to the Baltic are known, it would be helpful if the paper made explicit that the governance question is 'why haven't they been implemented?'. Failing to hit targets and redrafting the Baltic Action Plan suggests that something is missing.
I would suggest that the missing element is the political will to redefine private property rights associated with farmland (see Bromley & Hodge), to move from relying on rewarding voluntary reductions in environmental damage under the 'provider-gets-principle' (see Hanley) and to instead deploying the 'polluter-pays-principle' to mandate compliance through regulation and penalties.
Changing the presumed distribution of property rights and using regulatory policy instruments rather than incentive instruments ('sticks' rather than 'carrots' - see Bemelmans-Videc et al) is arguably a better way of addressing the negative externality (i.e., market failure) nature of the problem (internalising and monetising environmental attributes through Payments for Ecosystem Service is another approach, albeit more talked about than achieved in practice).
This political unwillingness partly reflects the enduring strength of the farming lobby, but also the fact that the Baltic is not under a single jurisdiction and therefore the public good nature of improving its condition suffers from the free-rider problem (i.e., why would one jurisdiction move first and risk penalising its farmers if other jurisdictions did not follow suit?). A comparison can perhaps be made with current Dutch proposals to use compulsory purchase powers to reduce pollution to meet domestically legally binding nutrient loading targets, or the possibility of compulsory livestock reductions in Ireland to meet domestic legally binding targets for GHG emission reductions.
I also have a couple of specific suggestions for edits.
i) Figure 2 appears to repeat itself - the top part of the diagram could be simply be deleted;
ii) Line 257 isn't quite right - SMRs have to include EU regs, but could go beyond this to include additional domestic regs - the fact that they tend not to highlights my point above about the default distribution of property rights.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
thank you again for taking the time to look into the manuscript.
I have inserted some of the reasons for implementation failure, including a reference to the public goods nature of the Baltic Sea, in Section 3.3. Likewise, I have inserted a reference to property rights in that section. A reference to the polluter pays principle is now established in the discussion. The issue of voluntariness is discussed throughout the manuscript as well. To highlight the difference of the proposed instruments (shortly mentioned at the end of the manuscript) to the voluntary instruments of the CAP, I inserted a ‘mandatory’. Introducing the Dutch scheme you mentioned would lead too far away from the topic which is why I would like to not include it.
Aside from that, I have not amended Figure 2 as the normative standards are an essential element of the method. I have revised the sentence on SMRs.
Kind regards
Reviewer 3 Report
Dear Author,
Thank you for updating your manuscript. I have seen and checked the improvement you included in the final version.
Author Response
Once again, kind regards for taking the time for the review.
Have a nice weekend.
