Identifying the Impact Factors on the Land Market in Nepal from Land Use Regulation
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis paper provides new insights into the land market in Nepal. I suggest that the authors revise this article.
1. This article is not well edited and has many title errors.
2. Table 2 is interesting. But the authors are not doing an effective analysis, just a list. I suggest adding some comparative analysis, or statistics.
3. The authors did not report the results of the interviews. The results they reported could not be verified. I suggest at least descriptive statistics.
4. In the discussion section, the authors should compare the results of this paper with the literature they reviewed to illustrate what is unique about Nepal.
Author Response
Please See file attached addressing comments
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsComments for author File: Comments.pdf
Moderate editing of English language required
Author Response
Please see the attached file
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe manuscript presents findings on the impact factors on the land market in Nepal from land use regulation. The authors identified an initial set of impact factors through a desktop review and reclassified the impact factors based on a visual analysis of thematic proximity. The authors identified perspective-based impact factors by qualitatively analyzing primary data collected from semi-structured interviews with land market stakeholders in Nepal. The authors compare these independently derived impact factors with those of the desktop literature review to derive land market impact factors on four dimensions.
It covers an interesting topic and the achievements can be useful for other case studies.
However, there are some criticisms in the manuscript that must be addressed.
Abstract
While the author presents the Abstract, answer the questions carefully: What problem did you study and why is it important? What methods did you use? What were your main results? And what conclusions can you draw from your results? Please make your abstract with more specific and quantitative results while it suits broader audiences.
It is suggested that author can refine this part.
Introduction
The current Introduction should be further improved. A good one includes at least four aspects: motivation/background, literature review, aim and contribution, and organization of the remains of the study.
Literature Review
2.2. What does it mean?
Some statements in the literature review section might need deeper analysis or discussion. To clarify the contributions of this study, the authors should point out the current specific knowledge gap more clearly.
Discussion
The structure and organization of the discussion section could be further optimized to enhance clarity. Try to organize content to connect your findings, interpretations, and existing literature more clearly. Ensure each paragraph has a clear theme and all paragraphs have smooth, logical flow.
Formatting issues: Figure 11-Figure 77, Figure 8 is missing
The originality and novelty of the paper needs to be further improved and clarified. What is the theoretical innovation of this article? The description in the paper is relatively vague, and the author needs to provide a clearer explanation.
Comments on the Quality of English Languageno
Author Response
Please see attached file addressing comments
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe manuscript is relevant and current. I have made suggestions for improving it below.
• Which scientific approach, e.g. social theory is closest to the authors when discussing this multifaceted topic? This could be described a little more clearly and in more detail, of course, only if the authors are committed to one of them.
• The authors examine Nepalese characteristics too alone, with few international comparisons, for example among neighbouring states, which are believed to have similarities. I assume this is necessary because globally Nepal is less well known in terms of the topic of research, but if there is a similarity with, for example, India, which is probably better known globally in terms of research topics, then describing it may also help to understand Nepalese characteristics.
• The Kathmandu Valley case study is not presented geographically, socially and economically far enough and more should be written about it. And I do not suppose that the choice of this case study in Nepal is yet sufficiently justified by objective reasons. Therefore, more should be written about this.
• To what extent do the authors think their empirical results in Kathmandu Valley can be generalized to other areas of Nepal?
• The manuscript contains hardly any of the "research limitation" statements usually used with scientific publications, although the qualitative research presented obviously has its limitations. More should therefore be written about the latter.
• Again, the "Discussion" and "Conclusions" sections are mostly about Nepal but do not give a brief comparison of how similar or different the statements described are to others, e.g. more or less similar research results in countries neighbouring Nepal.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageThe paper reads relatively well.
Author Response
Please see comments in attached file
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsComments for author File: Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear Reviewer
Thank you again for taking the time to review the changes to the article which has further improved its quality.
The changes to your comments are attached and highlighted in yellow in the revised article. The article has again been edited for any english/grammatical corrections.
Kind regards
The Authors
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe manucript has been improved a lot. Thank you for your answers. I accept them, but I would make an addition. Among the countries surrounding Nepal, it would also be worth briefly mentioning Bhutan in the literature comparison section. Because Bhutan has similarities to Nepal in terms of research topic, and there are also partially related Bhutanese researches.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageThe paper reads well.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer
Thank you again for your time in reviewing the changes to the manuscript.
The addition of further insights on the progress in Bhutan of land use regulation/zoning has been added as requested.
Further editing and english/grammar checks have also been undertaken.
See the new paragraph highlighted in yellow.
Kind regards
The Authors
