Investment Decisions of Blockchain-Based Anti-Counterfeiting Traceability Services in a High-Quality Fresh Supply Chain of China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Necessary corrections:
1. There is an urgent need to explain and describe broadly the place where the research has been done. Please rephrase the title of the article in order to point out what geographical cite it describes, f. ex. China, or a specified region in China.
2. A deep English editing and correction is NEEDED! F. ex.
Already in Abstract there is a part of the sentence, which does not make any sense
(…) result in helping improve the unreliability … (line: 9),
(…) should be: fresh products’ safety … (line: 39),
(..) both of them is ... (lines: 314),
3. Many sentences are too shallow, f. ex., in lines: 22-25,
4. Many sentences bear a sign of coloqualisms, f. ex. In lines: 32,
5. What does a double loss phenomenon mean? It needs explanation (line: 25).
6. There are a lot of places in the text which need citations, such as: lines: 29, 31, 38, 218,
7. I do not understand the writing style, where one single author writes: “we” and “our”, see: lines: 71, 79, 81, 92, 99, 208, 215, 327, 329, 311, 411, 494,
8. In the lines 405-412 there is a paragraph, which needs a deepen explanation. Why it is like this? Why do “a price discount” and “revenue-sharing contract” are proposed to be implemented?
9. In what aspect the blockchain-based traceability system for agri-food system have been analyzed and described by those mentioned authors? (lines: 114-124).
10. Does really only one author have analyzed blockchain-based traceability (line: 96).
11. Where is the detailed description of the methodology?
12. It is substantial to describe and explain:
- what is the research population,
- how % of the general population has been examined,
- why so many /less of them have been examined,
- what is the basic foundation for the research: methodological, organizational, etc.
- what kind of methods have been used,
- what are the restrictions of these methods,
- what are the criteria for selecting these methods have been used,
- what are the criteria for selecting the research population have been used,
- and the cited literature as a background for the research.
13. Please transform conclusions directly resulting from the analyses of statistical methods into conclusions of an applied nature
14. What are "the first and second order" conclusions of the analyses, which have been carried out?
15. Where, in the conclusion, is it proven that hypotheses have been confirmed or rejected.
16. What are the author's suggestions to reduce the limitations of the study in order to continue it (lines: 499-502).
17. The literature needs to be updated, by finding out more international authors.
Author Response
Reviewer 1:
1. There is an urgent need to explain and describe broadly the place where the research has been done. Please rephrase the title of the article in order to point out what geographical cite it describes, f. ex. China, or a specified region in China.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the title of this paper as “ Investment decisions of the blockchain-based anticounterfeiting traceability service in a high-quality fresh supply chain of China ”.
2. A deep English editing and correction is NEEDED! F. ex.
Already in Abstract there is a part of the sentence, which does not make any sense
(…) result in helping improve the unreliability … (line: 9),
(…) should be: fresh products’ safety … (line: 39),
(..) both of them is ... (lines: 314),
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the grammatical errors and the detail content see the revised manuscript.
3. Many sentences are too shallow, f. ex., in lines: 22-25,
4. Many sentences bear a sign of coloqualisms, f. ex. In lines: 32,
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised these sentences.
5. What does a double loss phenomenon mean? It needs explanation (line: 25).
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, the expression (i.e., a double loss phenomenon) is inaccurate and should be the loss of fresh products in circulation. We have revised the sentence.
6. There are a lot of places in the text which need citations, such as: lines: 29, 31, 38, 218,
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have added some citations in lines: 29, 31, 38, 218. In other places, we also added some citations. More detail contents see the revised manuscript.
7. I do not understand the writing style, where one single author writes: “we” and “our”, see: lines: 71, 79, 81, 92, 99, 208, 215, 327, 329, 311, 411, 494,
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the expression and used the third person to express our thoughts. In addition, we added some authors who revised the manuscript.
8. In the lines 405-412 there is a paragraph, which needs a deepen explanation. Why it is like this? Why do “a price discount” and “revenue-sharing contract” are proposed to be implemented?
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have explained the computing process and more detail contents see section 3.3. in addition, we explained the reasons why we used this contract. More detail contents see section 3.4.
9. In what aspect the blockchain-based traceability system for agri-food system have been analyzed and described by those mentioned authors? (lines: 114-124).
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised these sentences and explained that in what aspect the blockchain-based traceability system for agri-food system have been analyzed, more detail contents see section 1.1.
10. Does really only one author have analyzed blockchain-based traceability (line: 96).
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we added some authors who revised the manuscript.
11. Where is the detailed description of the methodology?
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we added the detailed description about the Stackelberg game. More detail contents see section 2.2.2.
12. It is substantial to describe and explain:
- what is the research population,
- how % of the general population has been examined,
- why so many /less of them have been examined,
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, in our article, our research is implemented in China, thus, the research population is in China and who may be a decision maker of a company or consumers. In addition, these decision makers want to adopt the blockchian-based ACTS, and they face the investment decision problems of the blockchian-based ACTS. Thus, these populations are our research population. The percentage about these populations are uncertain, however, it is true that some policymakers face this problem.
- what is the basic foundation for the research: methodological, organizational, etc.
- what kind of methods have been used,
- what are the restrictions of these methods,
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have explained the basic foundation about the method and the more detail contents see section 2.2.2. and the method (Stackelberg game) is suitable for describing the decision process of a fresh supply chain in China.
- what are the criteria for selecting these methods have been used,
- what are the criteria for selecting the research population have been used,
- and the cited literature as a background for the research.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, the criteria for selecting the method is according the decision process of a fresh supply chain in China. Because in China, the government is very supportive for the application of blockchain technology in agriculture, thus, we choose the supply chain members in China.
13. Please transform conclusions directly resulting from the analyses of statistical methods into conclusions of an applied nature
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the conclusions, and more detail contents see section 5.1.
14. What are "the first and second order" conclusions of the analyses, which have been carried out?
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have added the number of the conclusions, and more detail contents see section 5.1.
15. Where, in the conclusion, is it proven that hypotheses have been confirmed or rejected.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, in the section 4, we used an actual example to confirm the conclusions.
16. What are the author's suggestions to reduce the limitations of the study in order to continue it (lines: 499-502).
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the future research as the limitations and future research, and then offered the suggestions to reduce the limitations.
17. The literature needs to be updated, by finding out more international authors.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have added some literatures. More detail contents see section 1.
Reviewer 2 Report
The paper proposes the application of a blockchain-based anti-counterfeiting traceability system, using as a case study the Chinese market for fresh fruit. I found this paper of interest in Agriculture, and I thank the editor for the opportunity to review it. I have a few comments on this paper that is well written, organized, and based on a sound scientific methodology.
I would suggest the authors thoroughly discuss food fraud or counterfeiting in the introduction by defining it, providing figures about the incidence, listing the products that are majorly exposed to food counterfeit, and discussing the downsides on the economic actors and the functioning of the supply chains. Authors may found these papers of interest:
- Ehmke, M. D., Bonanno, A., Boys, K., & Smith, T. G. (2019). Food fraud: economic insights into the dark side of incentives. Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 63(4), 685-700.
- Robson, K., Dean, M., Haughey, S., & Elliott, C. (2021). A comprehensive review of food fraud terminologies and food fraud mitigation guides. Food Control, 120, 107516.
Also, authors may perform a cost-benefit analysis on the system they propose, as well as whether it can be applied in other food supply chains and other geographical context.
The authors do not discuss possible limitations of their study or the insights for future directions of research. Maybe they could discuss external validity of the results in terms of possible insights in other countries and/or additional variables that they would have liked to have to better answer to their research question.
I recommend that authors review the article thoroughly and consider using a professional proofreading service to improve the style of the article. Many sentences are unclear.
Author Response
Reviewer 2:
The paper proposes the application of a blockchain-based anti-counterfeiting traceability system, using as a case study the Chinese market for fresh fruit. I found this paper of interest in Agriculture, and I thank the editor for the opportunity to review it. I have a few comments on this paper that is well written, organized, and based on a sound scientific methodology.
I would suggest the authors thoroughly discuss food fraud or counterfeiting in the introduction by defining it, providing figures about the incidence, listing the products that are majorly exposed to food counterfeit, and discussing the downsides on the economic actors and the functioning of the supply chains. Authors may found these papers of interest:
- Ehmke, M. D., Bonanno, A., Boys, K., & Smith, T. G. (2019). Food fraud: economic insights into the dark side of incentives. Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 63(4), 685-700.
- Robson, K., Dean, M., Haughey, S., & Elliott, C. (2021). A comprehensive review of food fraud terminologies and food fraud mitigation guides. Food Control, 120, 107516.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the introduction section and added the aforementioned article in our manuscript. More detail contents see the section 0.
Also, authors may perform a cost-benefit analysis on the system they propose, as well as whether it can be applied in other food supply chains and other geographical context.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, in fact, the process that we gain the investment conditions is a cost-benefit analysis. In addition, our research method can be used to research other food supply chains in other geographical context and our findings have some applicability to similar supply chains in China.
The authors do not discuss possible limitations of their study or the insights for future directions of research. Maybe they could discuss external validity of the results in terms of possible insights in other countries and/or additional variables that they would have liked to have to better answer to their research question.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we added the section 6 (the limitations and future research). in the section 6, we considered the reviewer’s suggestion.
I recommend that authors review the article thoroughly and consider using a professional proofreading service to improve the style of the article. Many sentences are unclear.
Answer: thanks for your suggestion, we have revised the grammatical errors and more detail contents see the revised manuscript.
Finally, Thanks to the reviewers for their efforts to improve this article’s quality.
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I am satisfied with the corrections and proofreading of the text.
In the text there are still a few things to be improved, which are:.
1. In lines 38 the wording (...) the incidents about dairy products and meat are more" is too shallow ". It needs to be supplemented.
What does it mean?
2. In line 41 - Which enterprises? These sentences need supplemental citations (line 41).
3. Check the text again for the expressions "we", which acording to the authors have been corrected. See line 80 "(...) we chose ...".
4. In lines 414-426 is a very good, added part of the text.
Well done.
I wish you good luck!
Author Response
In the text there are still a few things to be improved, which are:.
1. In lines 38 the wording (...) the incidents about dairy products and meat are more" is too shallow ". It needs to be supplemented.
What does it mean?
Answer: thanks for your suggestions, we have deleted this sentence, and more detail contents see the introduction section.
2. In line 41 - Which enterprises? These sentences need supplemental citations (line 41).
Answer: thanks for your suggestions, we have revised this sentence, and more detail contents see the introduction section.
3. Check the text again for the expressions "we", which acording to the authors have been corrected. See line 80 "(...) we chose ...".
Answer: thanks for your suggestions, we have revised all the expressions “we”.
4. In lines 414-426 is a very good, added part of the text.
Well done.
I wish you good luck.
Reviewer 2 Report
I am currently fine with the modified manuscript version.
Author Response
Thank you very much.
