Rainwater Harvesting for Sustainable Agriculture in High Water-Poor Areas in the West Bank, Palestine
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Shadeed et al integrated agricultural water poverty (AWP) and agricultural rainwater harvesting suitability (ARWHS) maps to identify locations where agricultural rainwater harvesting (ARWH) benefits most for the West Bank, Palestine. This research study will help key decision makers to adopt suitable water resources management strategies to improve sustainable agriculture and accordingly to improve food security in Palestine and is within the scope of Water. The authors need to further improve the language of this paper.
Examples for language probelms:
193: contrary -> “In contrast”
184: “impacted” to “impact”
186: argue -> argues
208: has -> have
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you for your time and effort for given valuable comments. With no doubt, your comments were helpful to improve the quality of the revised version of the manuscript. Responses to your specific comments are given in the attached report.
All the best,
Sameer.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors have developed an excellent work about harvesting water in a zone with serious difficulties by poverty. The only question is about the combination of Discussion and Conclusion. Maybe the authors should consider to join Results and Discussion and to leave Conclusion as a standalone section.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you for your time and effort for given valuable comments. With no doubt, your comments were helpful to improve the quality of the revised version of the manuscript. Responses to your specific comments are given in the attached report.
All the best,
Sameer.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript investigates the possibility of identifying locations for successful implementation of Agricultural Rainwater Harvesting (ARWH) techniques using modern tools in water poor areas. This is an important subject with particular interest of arid and semi-arid regions of the world, namely it examines an interesting and opportune environmental subject. However, in the present form, I consider it is not suitable for publication in the Water Journal. This manuscript needs an important effort in order to become suitable for publishing.
Specifically, the manuscript has to be written according to the instructions for Authors of the WATER Journal; all symbols in equations, Tables, Figures and main text in italic font; references have to be rewritten in accordance with the Instructions for Authors of the journal.
Also, a general check of the citations in the reference list is needed.
Moreover, there is no unified definition of the term ‘rainwater harvesting (RWH)’ commonly accepted by the scientific community. Researchers employ a wide variety of terms and definitions to describe the various methods aimed at the use of, collection, and storage of rain runoff in order to increase the availability of water for drinking, irrigation, and so on in arid and semi-arid areas. In this way, their criterion is their own purposes and not a strict definition of the term “rainwater harvesting”.
While authors state (Lines 58 & 59): “RWH is defined as the collection and use of rainwater in situ or its storage for different future uses among which agricultural [23,24]”, they use the term “Agricultural Rainwater Harvesting (ARWH)” without the definition of its concept.
In my opinion, the definition of the concept of the Agricultural Rainwater Harvesting (ARWH) is needed. Similarly, the definitions of the terms "Agricultural Rainwater Harvesting Suitability (ARWHS)", "Agricultural Water Poverty (AWP)" and "Sustainable Agriculture" are needed in order to be the manuscript more understandable.
The citation [54] “Saaty, T.L.: Managing Forest Ecosystems. In Fundamentals of decision making with the analytic hierarchy process…..” does not cite in the main text.
Specific comments
Line 26
I would recommend the authors to add as a keyword and the: “Agricultural Rainwater Harvesting”.
Lines 35 & 36
Authors state: “Consequently, the dominant water resources management challenge is how to satisfy the increasing agricultural water demand to enhance food security for rapid world population expansion [9]”.
should be (in my opinion):
“Consequently, the dominant water resources management challenge is how to satisfy the increasing agricultural water demand to enhance food security due to the rapid world population expansion [9].”
Lines 44-46
“AWP can be attributed to natural/human- induced reasons [13,14]. AWP can be estimated by using the agricultural water poverty index (AWPI) which is an index that describes the sustainable agricultural water management on farm-level [1].”
should be
“AWP can be attributed to natural/human- induced reasons [13,14]. It can be estimated by using the agricultural water poverty index (AWPI) which is an index that describes the sustainable agricultural water management on farm-level [1].”
Lines 78 & 79
Authors state: “Elevation ranges from 1000 meters above mean sea level in Hebron to 375 meters below mean sea 78 level…”
should be (I propose)
“Elevation ranges from 1000 m above MSL in Hebron to 375 m below MSL…”
COMMENT: Internationally, the abbreviation of “mean sea level” is “MSL” or “msl”.
Lines 86-88
Please, check: The total is 100.3% (=62.0+14.3+2.6+14.3+5.0+0.7+1.4) not 100%.
Line 119
According to the Instructions for authors of the journal: “References must be numbered in order of appearance in the text (including table captions and figure legends)”. However in the main text the citation No [46] is displayed for the first time in Line 119, while the citation No [47] in Line 75.
Line 119
“…Table 2 and 3 show the preference…”
should be
“…Tables 2 and 3 show the preference…”
Table 1, Line 5, Column 2
“m3/hectare” should be “m3/ha”
COMMENT: The symbol of the unit “hectare” is “ha”.
Line 126, Table 2; Line 129, Table 3; Line 148, Table 4; Line 152, Table 5; Line 181, Table 6: Caption
“2019”: Clarify, what does it mean?
Lines 127 & 128
Please, delete the Lines 127 and 128, because “AA”, “CAPL”, “I”, “AE”, “EC”, “AR” and “IATGA” are defined in Table 1.
Lines 130 & 131
Please, delete the Lines 130 and 131, because “RD”, “CN”, “LU”, “SS”, “ST”, “ET” and “DDN” are defined in Lines 111-114.
Line 133
“…the consistency ratio using…” should be “…the consistency ratio, CR, using…”
Line 137 & 138
“Where: CR is the consistency ratio, CI is the consistency index, RI is a random consistency index, λ is a normalized principal eigenvector and n is a number of constraints (criteria).” should be
“Where CI is the consistency index, RI is a random consistency index, λ is a normalized principal eigenvector and n is a number of constraints (criteria).”
COMMENT: “CI”, “RI”, “λ” “n” in italic font.
Line 143
“(See Table 4 and Table 5)” should be “(See Tables 4 and 5)”.
Line 147
“…by GIS (ArcMap 10.3) (See Figure 3 and Figure 4)….” should be “…by GIS (ArcMap 10.3 of ESRI) (See Figures 3 and 4)….”
Table 4, Line 7, Column 2
“(m3/hectare)” should be “(m3/ha)”
Lines 149 & 150
Please, delete the Lines 149 and 150, because “AA”, “CAPL”, “I”, “AE”, “EC”, “AR” and “IATGA” are defined in Table 1.
Lines 153 & 154
Please, delete the Lines 153 and 154, because “RD”, “CN”, “LU”, “SS”, “ST”, “ET” and “DDN” are defined in Lines 111-114.
Line 157, Figure 3; Line 159, Figure 4; Line 176, Figure 5; Line 198, Figure 6; Line 216, Figure 8; Line 223, Figure 9;caption:
“2019”: Clarify, what does it mean?
Table 7, Line 2, Column 2
“(%)” should be “Area (%)”
Line 243
Please, define the abbreviation “MCDA”.
Lines 274 & 275
“Forouzani, M.; Karami, E. Agricultural water poverty index and sustainability. Agron. Sustain. Dev. 2010, 31, 415–432.
should be
Forouzani, M.;Karami, E.. Agricultural water poverty index and sustainability. Agron. Sustain. Dev. 2011, 31(2), 415-432.
COMMENT: The year is “2011”.
Line 307
“James, W.; Lisa, H.; Rebecca,T. Water and poverty in the United States. Geoforum. 2007, 38, 801-814”
should be
Wescoat Jr., J.L.; Headington, L., Theobald, R. Water and poverty in the United States. Geoforum 2007, 38, 801–814
Lines 316 & 317
“Shadeed, S.; Lange, J. Rainwater harvesting to alleviate water scarcity under dry conditions: A case study in Faria catchment, Palestine. Water Sci. Eng. 2010, 3, 132-143.”
should be
“Shadeed, S.; Lange, J. Rainwater harvesting to alleviate water scarcity in dry conditions: A case study in Faria Catchment, Palestine. Water Sci. Eng. 2010
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you for your time and effort for given valuable comments. With no doubt, your comments were helpful to improve the quality of the revised version of the manuscript. Responses to your specific comments are given in the attached report.
All the best,
Sameer.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
Paper deals with very actual problem of water scarcity, and with analysis of one of the possible way for solving this problem, i.e. rainwater harvesting. Although authors provided very detailed analysis of the mentioned topic, I am opinion that paper does not satisfy the standard of the Water journal. There are many reasons for this.
1) Paper does not gives insight into data about precipitation. There is a lack of precipitation data series presentation. At least basic statistical analysis should be provided.
2) I can not see the novelty of the manuscript. Author should give at least one or two sentence with high impact conclusion, or statement why this paper is worth reading.
3) Professor of English language or even native English speaker should read entire manuscript. Authors should avoid writing in the first face of singular or plural.
4) Section ''Discussion and Conclusion'' should be separated.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you for your time and effort for given valuable comments. With no doubt, your comments were helpful to improve the quality of the revised version of the manuscript. Responses to your specific comments are given in the attached report.
All the best,
Sameer.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 3 Report
In my opinion, the authors have made an important effort to improve the quality of the manuscript. This version (ver. 2) is much better from the previous (original version). However, minor revisions are needed to be suitable for publication. Consequently, I recommend acceptance of the manuscript after minor revision.
General comments
Line 25
“…rainwater harvesting, agricultural…” should be “…rainwater harvesting; agricultural…”
Line 63
The authors state: “RWH can be defined in many ways, …..”
COMMENT: Concerning the definition of rainwater harvesting in a recent article Yannopoulos et al. (2019) underlined: “However, there is not a unified definition about this term that is commonly accepted by the scientific community. Researchers employ a wide variety of terms and definitions to describe the various methods aimed at the use of, collection, and storage of rain runoff in order to increase the availability of water for drinking, irrigation, and so on in arid and semi-arid areas. In this way, their criterion is their own purposes and not a strict definition of the term “rainwater harvesting”.
REFERENCE: Yannopoulos, S.; Giannopoulou, I; Kaiafa-Saropoulou, M. Investigation of the Current Situation and Prospects for the Development of Rainwater Harvesting as a Tool to Confront Water Scarcity Worldwide. Water 2019, 11, 2168; doi: 10.3390/w11102168
Line 90
“….in the middle east with…” should be “….in the Middle East with…”
Figures 1, 5, 6 & 8
“Kilometers” should be “km”
Lines 99 & 100
“In general, rainfall averages decrease from west to east. Generally, the trend for rainfall in the West Bank increases northwest and decreases southeast”.
COMMENT: The aforementioned sentences have to be written in correct English.
Line 107
“From the table, basic statistics….” should be “From the Table 1, basic statistics….”
Line 115
“…rain-fed agricultural…” should be “…rainfed agricultural…”
Lines 178 & 179
“GIS is employed to estimate agricultural water poverty index (AWPI) and agricultural rainwater harvesting suitability index (ARWHSI) through…”
should be
“GIS is employed to estimate agricultural water poverty index (AWPI) and agricultural rainwater harvesting suitability index (ARWHSI) through…”
NOTE: “AWPI” and “AWPI” in italic as in equation of Line 182.
Line 183
“…Where (???? ?? ??????)? is the final cell index, Wi is a normalized…”
should be
“…Where ????j ?? ??????j is the final cell index, Wi is a normalized…”
Line 201
“Results shown in the above table indicate…”
should be
“Results shown in the Table 7 indicate…”
Line 203
“….rain-fed areas….” should be “….rainfed areas….”
Line 219
“It is noticed from the figure that…”
should be
“It is noticed from the Figure 7 that…”
Line 246
“Results presented in Table 7 demonstrate…”
should be
“Results presented in Table 8 demonstrate…”
A short note from the Reviewer to the authors.
In the former my review report, I wrote:
“Specifically, the manuscript has to be written according to the instructions for Authors of the WATER Journal; all symbols in equations, Tables, Figures and main text in italic font; references have to be rewritten in accordance with the Instructions for Authors of the journal”.
The answer of the authors to my above comment is the following:
“Done for the symbols of equations but not for the abbreviations in the texts, tables and figures. However, I went throughout the instructions and didn’t see that abbreviations have to be written in italic font”.
My answer to the author comment is the following.
“I have never claimed that the abbreviations have to be written in italic. In my text, I refer symbols not abbreviations. So, I agree with the authors”.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you again for the in depth reading. Your comments/suggestions were considered in the revised version of the manuscript. Responses to your specific comments are given in the attached report.
All the best,
Sameer.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
Authors have changed and improved earlier version of the manuscript. I am of the opinion that paper deserves to be published, although I can not see high scientific contribution to the analyzed topic, despite that West Bank has problems with availability of water.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
I would like to thank you again for your positive opinion toward publishing of this manuscript at the Water Journal.
All the best,
Sameer.
