Rural Livelihoods and Climate Change Adaptation in Laggard Transitional Economies: A Case from Bosnia and Herzegovina

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

 

The authors present a detailed quantitative case study of how livelihoods are affected by climate change and how farmers are responding in three zone of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The paper is very well written and presented and produces interesting and useful data and analysis on the questions at hand. I recommend it for publication once the following revisions are implemented.

I think there are two main ways in which the present paper needs to be improved:

Firstly one of the main themes of the paper is adaptation to climate change but there is little consideration in the literature of this important theme. This means that the results are largely assessed without reference to what has already been said and done in this field. The authors may find it useful to further consider the work of Adger to better frame the research. Relatedly, the paper considers SLA as central to the paper, then neglects to fully use it when considering adaptation. It would be interesting more explicitly consider how attempts at adaptation can reinforce the capitals.

Secondly, what is lacking for me is deeper consideration of perception. Over the last 15 years there has been an emerging literature which shows the subjectivity of perception. The work of Grothmann and Patt (2005) show the importance of understanding perception and how it can influence adaptation. More recently Oakes (2019) has shown how perception interacts with culture and may constrain or influence climate change adaptation including migration. These works are qualitative and take a different approach to your paper, but it would be useful to acknowledge the richness of this field.

Both of the above comments could be addressed through inserting a larger literature section within  the introduction. It would then also be possible to relate the findings to the broader literature in the results/conclusion.  

I also note the following comments which require simple elaboration:

 

123-6 It is unclear what this bias is, and how your approach avoided it. Please expand.

128 I would delete the sea area, it is confusing and not useful

215 define extension – does this refer to agricultural extension?

224-7 This is rather repetitive

476-9 Be explicit that these subsidies may therefore also encourage unsustainable or obsolete practices

533-4 This statement needs qualification – can you justify the use of “traditionally” “inherently” “design” and “function”.

578-80 This is a very interesting finding which deserves further examination

591 “due to” should be inserted

699-701 A recommendation of more investment is rather obvious and should be expanded upon

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Kind regards,

The authors

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript is more appropriate for a local journal. There are no general lessons learned that can be applied to other places. There is no theoretical background or argument that aids in interpreting the data. The study is not placed in a line of research, based on previous published papers, nor is the study justified in filling a gap in the existing literature.  Instead, it reads more like a survey report. This may be of interest to the people of BH, but not the general readership of Sustainability.

The methodological framework is poorly explained and based on low-quality references. Data collection methods need further explanation to be replicated. At the very least, key questions asked should be shown in a table. An explanation of the statistical analysis is missing altogether. The results are not explained based on existing academic literature.

I have two main lines for suggestions to the authors:

Submit to a local journal, not an International one. Little or no changes need to be made to be manuscript for this. If you still want to submit this manuscript to an International journal, you need to place the manuscript in a line of research. This means that the current literature on a specific subject has to be cited, and your research needs to take this line a bit further down the line. For example, look at the conclusion on line 683: “The increased incidence of adverse weather events leads to lower and less predictable incomes from agriculture due to production declines and variations, and as the alternative employment options are limited, climate change may lead to increased poverty and vulnerability for those who lack the capacity to adapt”. What can you find in the literature along this line? What evidence has been presented by previous research in this sense? How does the data you present help prove an argument that continues along the line of the research cited? What are the implications if your argument turns out to be correct?

The predictions starting on line 687 should be removed. Academic research is not a crystal ball. In line 700, a recommendation is made to increase investment. Although I would personally agree with that, academic research is not about voicing opinions, but about arguing based on available data. What evidence do you have to back up this recommendation? In sum, recommendations need to be in line with the evidence and conclusions provided.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Kind regards,

The authors

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The purpose of the article was to present the problem of livelihood and adaptation to climate change in delayed transition economies. The article presents the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The article is extensive, but suggests to show other results on this topic (comparative analysis). Figure 1 proposes to describe in more detail what it brings to work - the essence and meaning, why such a division of the area? Tables 1-5 present a very small research sample (35, 33, 36) - this indicates very poor analyzes, it is difficult to show percentage values on such a small sample. In my opinion, the most valuable chapter in the article is 4.4.2. I propose to enrich the article with positions of people dealing with topics, e.g. R.J. Stouffer, T.F. Stocker, C. Prentice and others. In many places, the article is for informational purposes only.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Kind regards,

The authors

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript is much better. Still needs language editing.

Line 12, add comma after "conditions"

Line 23, "On a positive..."

Keywords are repeated from title. Maybe others will be more useful.

Line 39, remove comma after "sluggish"

Line 51, "income" instead of "incomes"

Line 56, "the backbone"

Line 95, "does include"

Line 177, "construct the living" is unclear

Lines 189-194, grammar is confusing

Line 197, not clear why "free" is both in brackets and quotation marks

Line 210, "was massive"

Line 231, "a.s.l"

Line 258, the instrument is the questionnaire and the method is the interview. One should not be "considered" the other.

Line 269 and elsewhere, too many mentions to supplementary files. Just one time should be enough.

Lines 291-294, needs subscripts in the text as in the formula above.

Line 294, one sentence paragraph is not correct.

Line 798, is this idea also in the conclusions? Reads like a conclusion.

Line 764, "needs to learn" may be changed to "it is recommended that...". Shouldn't this be in the conclusions too?

Conclusions section can be improved with recommendations for policy and for future research.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We are delighted that you are satisfied with the changes in the revised version of our manuscript, based on your and other reviewers’ feedback. We also thank you four thoroughly checking our manuscript and indicating where our language and conclusions can be improved. We hope that you will be satisfied with the final revisions made in the manuscript. Thank you once again for taking the time to review our paper.

Kind regards,

The authors

 

Point-by-point response

The manuscript is much better. Still needs language editing.

Line 12, add comma after "conditions"

done

Line 23, "On a positive..."

done

Keywords are repeated from title. Maybe others will be more useful.

We added “perceptions” and “Sustainable Livelihoods Approach” to keywords.

Line 39, remove comma after "sluggish"

done

Line 51, "income" instead of "incomes"

done

Line 56, "the backbone"

done

Line 95, "does include"

done

Line 177, "construct the living" is unclear

replaced with “…based upon which one makes decisions to produce outcomes necessary for sustenance and well-being”

Lines 189-194, grammar is confusing

We edited the transition between paragraphs and did some minor edits to make it clearer (L187-198)

Line 197, not clear why "free" is both in brackets and quotation marks

Brackets and quotation marks are deleted

Line 210, "was massive"

done

Line 231, "a.s.l"

changed, both in the line specified and Line 227

Line 258, the instrument is the questionnaire and the method is the interview. One should not be "considered" the other.

We changed the sentence to “Therefore, semi-structured interview was selected as the data collection method”. (L258-259)

Line 269 and elsewhere, too many mentions to supplementary files. Just one time should be enough.

We removed the mention of supplementary files at the end of the previous paragraph (L241). Supplementary figures, tables and appendix (questionnaire) are not mentioned more than once in the paper now and are only used when specifically required.

Lines 291-294, needs subscripts in the text as in the formula above.

done

Line 294, one sentence paragraph is not correct.

The sentence is moved to the paragraph at Line 281.

Line 798, is this idea also in the conclusions? Reads like a conclusion.

We added this in the conclusions, thank you (L857-858).

Line 764, "needs to learn" may be changed to "it is recommended that...". Shouldn't this be in the conclusions too?

We changed it to “It is recommended, however, that government and policymakers learn from these…” (L769). It is also added in conclusions (L871-873)

Conclusions section can be improved with recommendations for policy and for future research.

We did some minor changes in the last paragraph of the conclusions (L869-884). We hope you are pleased with the changes.

Reviewer 3 Report

Good

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

We are delighted that you are satisfied with the changes in the revised version of our manuscript, based on your and other reviewers’ feedback. We also hope that you will be satisfied with the final revisions made in the manuscript. Thank you once again for taking the time to review our paper.

Kind regards,

The authors