Effects of Human Social-Economic Activities on Vegetation Suitability in the Yellow River Basin, China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
1. the abstract is almost a mini literature review as it is made up of general statements without reference to findings of the current study
2. authors need to state more clearly the key finding and some concluding remarks based on the finding
3. authors need more reference to adequate the finding
4. non consistent on using the citations type (need to recheck)
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
We tried our best to improve the manuscript according to your comments. These changes will not influence the content and framework of the paper. A point-by-point response is listed in the attachment and the changes are marked in the revised paper.
We appreciate for your warm work earnestly, and hope that the correction will meet with approval.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Dear authors!
We were interested to get acquainted with the manuscript "Effects of Human Social-economic Activities on Vegetation Suitability in the Yellow River Basin, China". The article is extremely relevant.
However, there are comments on the text of the article. There is a mixture of sections "Basic concepts, methods and data", "Results", "Discussion". It is necessary to clearly separate them from each other. Parts of the article look torn apart. It is necessary to build the text and links between sections.
The article contains practically no illustrative material. The authors received good materials, but could not convincingly and clearly present them to a wide audience of readers. Answering the following comments will help improve the quality of the article:
1. Please provide a map of the study area in Section “2. Basic concepts, methods and data".
2. Please provide maps of the obtained results in Section 3. Do not use only a textual description. It will be much easier for the reader to understand the results of your research if you show its results not only on graphs, but also on maps.
3. Clearly separate the "Results" and "Discussion" sections from each other.
4. Why do you describe in section 3, for example, "Technical framework for physical geographic area division"? This should be described in section “2. Basic concepts, methods and data.
5. Specify in the section “2. Basic concepts, methods and data” for which operational-territorial units the study was performed (physical geographic area, different reaches of the Yellow River, etc.). Give a description of these units in “2. Basic concepts, methods and data. Show their geographic location on maps.
6. In the "Discussion" section, compare your results with other regions of the world. Indicate the difficulties and unresolved issues that arose when using your methodology.
7. In general, please give a broader review of the literature in the work. In section 1, indicate how the problem under study is solved in other countries, indicate the work of authors not only from Asia.
8. Perhaps the section “4. Conclusions and implications" should be shortened.
The article requires significant revision and can be adopted only after the corrections have been made.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
We tried our best to improve the manuscript according to your comments. A point-by-point response was listed in the attachment and the changes were marked in the revised paper.
We appreciate for your warm work earnestly, and hope that the correction will meet with approval.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The influence of 24 socio-economic factors (in the sphere of production, life and policy) on the sustainability of the plant cover was analyzed. Data were used for a total of 448 locations (282 counties, 128 municipal districts and 38 county-level cities) along the Yellow River Basin during 2018. In total, 357 different experts were involved in the study. Multivariate regression analysis was used to assess the influencing factors. As a result of this large-scale research, interesting and important results for the region were obtained, on the basis of which the main conclusions of the analysis were highlighted.
The authors need to revise the text and edit some passages. Below are some of the noted inaccuracies and more.
124-130 – I propose to delete.
177 Fertilizer applied per mu - Redaction is needed.
187 – 188 â‘£Per capita urban disposable income and ⑤ 187 per capita urban disposable income – Redaction is needed.
228 pratacultural science – may be horticultural science? Not clear.
229 grassroots forest – maybe natural forest? Not clear.
236 - In this paper, - delete; the upper – to be “The upper”
240 – Region; - to be “Region.”
291 - Firstly, the impact of production activities is discussed. – delete
354 *is p<0.1 – to be “*p<1” …. and so on
354-355 - Because the partial coefficients are too small, 3-4 decimal places are retained, the same as below. - It is not clear - redaction is needed.
356-360 – The text belongs to Methods.
383 - but the effect is not so good – to delete one not
450 - than counties that did not – to be “than in counties that did not.”
458 - The ecological environment – to be “The environment…”
460 - also ............................................
The research is interesting, but I would like to ask whether the observed trends are maintained during the period 2019 - 2022 or is there some change?
Your study does not address the impact of innovations on vegetation cover. The development of modern society relies on raising the human standard on the basis of the implementation of innovations in all activities. However, this increases the rate and volume of natural resources usage. How could we protect the environment and plant resources in particular?
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
We tried our best to improve the manuscript according to your comments. A point-by-point response was listed in the attachment and the changes were marked in the revised paper.
We appreciate for your warm work earnestly, and hope that the correction will meet with approval.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Dear authors.
Thank you for responding to the reviewer's comments.
The article can be published in a present form.
