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  • Degen Lin 1,*,
  • Chuanqi Hu 2 and
  • Yingxian Yu 1
  • et al.

Reviewer 1: Xiaodong Yang Reviewer 2: Anonymous

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 

Many thanks to the editor for inviting me to review Lin et al's paper "Risk Assessment of World Corn Salinization Hazard Factors Based on EPIC Model and so on. Information Diffusion ". Overall, I think this paper is very valuable, it provides the basic theoretical support for global food security. However, it has some shortcomings at present. I have listed them below in the hope that it will be helpful for the author to improve the paper.

1.     The study of corn appears only in the last paragraph of the Introduction, which is obviously not enough. I suggest that the author should add a paragraph describing the research on salinization hazards and corn.

2.     EPIC0509 should be covered in some detail in the Methods section.

3.     Line 126 and LINE 128 require references to support your classification

4.     The Conclusion needs to be split into two parts. In part as a conclusion, it includes only a few sentences that summarize the whole text, and it is a few points that the reader can take home. In contrast, the second part is the outlook and shortcomings, which can be included in the Discussion.

5.     The source of the formula 1-7, need support references

6.     In general, when using a model to analyze an event, it should have some criteria to evaluate its good or bad. EPIC model is used to simulate the daily salinity stress threshold, and then evaluated the intensity and risk of salinization-induced disaster. However, in the paper, only the comparison results of HWSD and GLASOD are used to support the rationality of the model. In addition, the model should have its own accuracy and an analysis of the predictive validity of the model using the data. These two aspects should be shown in the paper.

Author Response

Dear Editors and Reviewers, I am very grateful for the thorough review and valuable suggestions provided for my manuscript entitled “Risk Assessment of World Corn Salinization Hazard Factors Based on EPIC Model and Information Diffusion” (Manuscript ID: land-2655736). Your feedback is instrumental in enhancing the quality and comprehensiveness of the paper. We have made changes to the manuscript based on your comments, and all changes are marked in red font. Our responses and associated amendments and additions relating to the reviewer comments are as follows: Referee(s)' Comments to Author: Reviewer 1 R1.The study of corn appears only in the last paragraph of the Introduction, which is obviously not enough. I suggest that the author should add a paragraph describing the research on salinization hazards and corn. A: Thank you for your suggestion. We understand your desire for more information regarding corn and salinization hazards. In the manuscript, the section 2.1.2, titled "Mechanism of Salt Stress in Maize", discusses the principles of how corn is affected by salinization hazards. However, we believe the focus of this manuscript is on evaluating the disaster situation of salinization, rather than on how corn is threatened by salt stress. The introduction should organize the academic history of the core issues the article focuses on, and should not be overly lengthy, thus it might be appropriate to discuss the relationship between corn and salinization in section 2.1.2, please see Lines 110-125. R2.EPIC0509 should be covered in some detail in the Methods section. A:Your suggestion makes a lot of sense, and based on your advice, we have revised section 2.3.1 to "Features and Simulation Process of EPIC0509," incorporating an introduction to the distinctive features of this version, please see Lines 158-165. R3.Line 126 and LINE 128 require references to support your classification A: Thank you for your suggestion, the references upon which the classification is based have been noted in the text, please see Lines 131. R4.The Conclusion needs to be split into two parts. In part as a conclusion, it includes only a few sentences that summarize the whole text, and it is a few points that the reader can take home. In contrast, the second part is the outlook and shortcomings, which can be included in the Discussion. A: I completely agree with your suggestion. I have moved the second paragraph of the Conclusion section to section 4.3 in the Discussion, as the outlook and shortcomings, please see Lines 435-448. R5.The source of the formula 1-7, need support references A: Thank you for your suggestion, we have noted the references for the formulas in the text, please see Lines 189-205. R6.In general, when using a model to analyze an event, it should have some criteria to evaluate its good or bad. EPIC model is used to simulate the daily salinity stress threshold, and then evaluated the intensity and risk of salinization-induced disaster. However, in the paper, only the comparison results of HWSD and GLASOD are used to support the rationality of the model. In addition, the model should have its own accuracy and an analysis of the predictive validity of the model using the data. These two aspects should be shown in the paper. A: Your suggestions have given us a lot of inspiration. In the future, we will add the analysis of model prediction effectiveness in our research on salinity loss-risk and the prediction of salinity risk under the background of climate change.

We appreciate for Reviewer’s warm work earnestly, and hope that the corrections will meet with the editor’s approval.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

 

Dear Section Managing Editor Mr. Nikola Stojanovic,

I carefully examined that includes the integration of the EPIC model, which can simulate daily agricultural activities against the salinization threat and their interactions within ecosystems titled "- (land-2655736) Risk Assessment of World Corn Salinization Hazard Factors Based on EPIC Model and Information Diffusion".

The manuscript is well structured. The abstract should be including quantitative results.

The article tries to address a current issue on a global scale. Although the process-based EPIC model was produced based on erosion, it is widely used by scientists around the world to examine how different land management affects the environment. For example, https://iiasa.ac.at/models-tools-data/epic-iiasa

This manuscript is up to date and provides important insights into modeling approaches on a global scale.

I declare it suitable for publication as a result of minor corrections below.

Introduction

Page 2, Line 36-48; Indeed, the latest regional and global studies on the land use of salinity. Please refer to the literature:

--Predictive Mapping of Electrical Conductivity and Assessment of Soil Salinity in a Western Türkiye Alluvial Plain. https://doi.org/10.3390/land11122148   

--FAO GSASmap v1.0, Global Map of Salt-Affected Soils. Available online: https://www.fao.org/3/cb7247en/cb7247en.pdf

--Predicting long-term dynamics of soil salinity and sodicity on a global scale.  https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2013771117    

The innovation of the study compared to the existing literature should be clearly explained and the hypothesis of the study should be formulated end of introduction.

Materials and Methods

Please mention about EPIC instead of general information about "Crop growth simulation models" in Section 2.1.1.

There should be a reference to the part where you declare the EPIC version on line 104.

Section 2.2 title, please control.

The links about  several digital database in Table 1 should be in the reference section. Do they need to be in the text?

Results

Since you used the expression "mean", is this the average of the years?

Or is the model a scholastic model? Is it run iteratively, and final result  is “mean” ? If the second situation exists, what is the idea of presenting "standard deviation maps" and adding them to the discussion?

Would be very useful for the reader if you could provide "zoomed" maps to the few regions you mentioned between around line 267 and 274 (especially northwestern China).

If you can do this, I recommend you add it to the main text, if not, at least add it to the supplement.

The results are very well presented. However, studies and discussions on a global scale should be added. Can relevant stakeholders or policy makers gain useful insights about the of the final predictive based maps ? I'd like to see discussions about these.

Conclusion

Conclusion is quite long. Sections containing the evaluation criteria (R2 values) of the models should be included in the summary.

Should be focus on the clear take-home message.

 

 

Sincerely yours,

 

 

 

Author Response

Dear Editors and Reviewers, I am very grateful for the thorough review and valuable suggestions provided for my manuscript entitled “Risk Assessment of World Corn Salinization Hazard Factors Based on EPIC Model and Information Diffusion” (Manuscript ID: land-2655736). Your feedback is instrumental in enhancing the quality and comprehensiveness of the paper. We have made changes to the manuscript based on your comments, and all changes are marked in red font. Our responses and associated amendments and additions relating to the reviewer comments are as follows: Referee(s)' Comments to Author: Reviewer 2 Introduction R1.Page 2, Line 36-48; Indeed, the latest regional and global studies on the land use of salinity. Please refer to the literature: --Predictive Mapping of Electrical Conductivity and Assessment of Soil Salinity in a Western Türkiye Alluvial Plain. https://doi.org/10.3390/land11122148 --FAO GSASmap v1.0, Global Map of Salt-Affected Soils. Available online: https://www.fao.org/3/cb7247en/cb7247en.pdf --Predicting long-term dynamics of soil salinity and sodicity on a global scale. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2013771117 The innovation of the study compared to the existing literature should be clearly explained and the hypothesis of the study should be formulated end of introduction. A: Thank you very much for providing us with the three articles. I have incorporated them into the references as numbers [29], [30], and [31], please see Lines 29-31. Materials and Methods R2.Please mention about EPIC instead of general information about "Crop growth simulation models" in Section 2.1.1. A:Your suggestion is very reasonable. I have revised the section 2.1.1 from explaining the working principles of Crop Growth Simulation Models to introducing the advantages of the EPIC model, based on your advice, please see Lines 96-109. R3.There should be a reference to the part where you declare the EPIC version on line 104. A:I agree with your suggestion, and I have added the reference that indicates the version of EPIC, please see Lines 160 or Reference[70]. R4.Section 2.2 title, please control. A: The title has only one word ”data” and cannot be controlled anymore. Thank you! R5.The links about several digital database in Table 1 should be in the reference section. Do they need to be in the text? A: Thank you for your advice. The URLs in the table have been removed and placed in the references section，please see Table 1. Results R6.Since you used the expression "mean", is this the average of the years? Or is the model a scholastic model? Is it run iteratively, and final result is “mean” ? If the second situation exists, what is the idea of presenting "standard deviation maps" and adding them to the discussion? A: We understand your confusion well. The value for the mean was calculated based on various data from the years 1971 to 2004, using the EPIC model to obtain the annual salinity stress index, which in turn was used to compute the multi-year average, please see Lines 268. R7.Would be very useful for the reader if you could provide "zoomed" maps to the few regions you mentioned between around line 267 and 274 (especially northwestern China). If you can do this, I recommend you add it to the main text, if not, at least add it to the supplement. A: Thank you for the reviewer's feedback. We have added this "zoomed" maps to the main text, please see Lines 272 and 317-321. R8.The results are very well presented. However, studies and discussions on a global scale should be added. Can relevant stakeholders or policy makers gain useful insights about the of the final predictive based maps ? I'd like to see discussions about these. A: Your suggestion is very insightful, four policy recommendations have been added to section 4.2 of the discussion, please see Lines 420-434. Conclusion R9.Conclusion is quite long. Sections containing the evaluation criteria (R2 values) of the models should be included in the summary. Should be focus on the clear take-home message. A: This suggestion is very good. We add the evaluation criteria (R2 values) of the models in the abstract, please see Lines 33. As for the suggestion "Conclusion is quite long", it is similar to that of Reviewer 1-R4, see Reviewer 1-R4 for the specific modification. We appreciate for Reviewer’s warm work earnestly, and hope that the corrections will meet with the editor’s approval.