Summer Farmers, Diversification and Rural Tourism—Challenges and Opportunities in the Wake of the Entrepreneurial Turn in Swedish Policies (1991–2019)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

General Comments

 Actually, there is nothing normative or no single item list to be faulted. The theme of the article is intresting, written in clear mode, the introduction, methods, result and conclusions are consistent.

My comments concerns the article from the perspective of the scientific journal Sustainability.

• The article is written almost in the mode as for a nice review article for a popular-science magazine. It has obviously descriptive character with less itemised information, almost no quantitavie data, e.g at least on the number of farms belonging to this or other type of enrepreneurial strategies, on the approximate number of animals in different types of farms, on approximate number of visitors, not speaking on proximate income, etc.
• There is no attempt to give at least an estimative assessment of   the possible development of the issue, neither  any proximate proposal which would solve the challenges.
• In this focus, the article is to long, e.g. describing also some theoretical issues which concern the main theme just mediate.
• Than there rose a question, what is the concrete scientific finding of the research, what are the knowledge not known or not expected untill yet. I think that the general  (qualitative) information on the types of summer farming were more-less known and expected also before research. What could be new were the data on those types. Probably the authors have it (?)

Author Response

Review Report Form          Reviewer 1

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report

( ) I would like to sign my review report

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required

( ) Moderate English changes required

( ) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required

(x) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

General Comments

Actually, there is nothing normative or no single item list to be faulted. The theme of the article is interesting, written in clear mode, the introduction, methods, result and conclusions are consistent.

We appreciate these kind words and we are grateful for the following comments.

My comments concern the article from the perspective of the scientific journal Sustainability.

• The article is written almost in the mode as for a nice review article for a popular-science magazine. It has obviously descriptive character with less itemised information, almost no quantitative data, e.g at least on the number of farms belonging to this or other type of entrepreneurial strategies, on the approximate number of animals in different types of farms, on approximate number of visitors, not speaking on proximate income, etc.

The study is qualitative and common practices for qualitative analysis in social sciences and humanities have been used. The main methods used, CBPR and phenomenography have followed a protocol and have been analyzed systematically. Phenomenography, which is a method used in humanities and social sciences is used to systematize collection of data and make a systematic analysis of qualitative data. We have also used theories that we feel are appropriate for a qualitative analysis. However, we do agree with the reviewer that we can add more information about the size of the population and sample, the numerics behind the workshops, etc. We have addressed this in lines 188-203 for how methods have been used in the analysis and 228 to 297 for analytical framework (theories) .  

Results of the analytical approach can be found under results where summer farm strategies were identified and thereafter presented. 

There is no attempt to give at least an estimative assessment of the possible development of the issue, neither any proximate proposal which would solve the challenges.

This article analyses the situation, but we have not issued policy recommendations. During the project summer farmers received feedback on how to improve their potential for future economic development. 

It is difficult to estimate or speculate on the future development since the realities for different summer farmers are very different and the development is mostly determined by political decisions, e.g. size and direction of subsidies, food production and market regulations, and political decisions have a tendency to be subjective in their nature. We have, however, added a reflection under conclusions. 

In this focus, the article is too long, e.g. describing also some theoretical issues which concern the main theme just mediate.

We have tried to shorten the article down and elaborate on just the main issues by illustrating results in a more efficient way. But as we see it is essential to discuss theoretical issues in qualitative analysis.

• Than there rose a question, what is the concrete scientific finding of the research, what are the knowledge not known or not expected until yet. I think that the general  (qualitative) information on the types of summer farming were more-less known and expected also before research. What could be new were the data on those types. Probably the authors have it (?)

This is really a justified criticism and we are especially grateful for this. Of course we are aware that several aspects are previously known and substantial contributions were made by various authors for example Eriksson, 2013 and Larsson 2009 and 2017 about the Swedish transhumance system. There are also many contributions with an international perspective. In the Swedish case previous studies have highlighted actions by summer farmers empirically. However, none has to our knowledge looked specifically on the various entrepreneurial strategies that have been taken and there are no holistic evaluations of the impact of the entrepreneurial turn, neither on summer farming or other aspects of agriculture. We did know from before that at least a part of the population has become hubs for tourism or that at least many tourism activities are sold and offered. But the entrepreneurial perspective has been neglected and we argue that it is necessary to analyze summer farms using entrepreneurial tools to really understand the situation of summer farms as micro-enterprises. It is not enough to make an empirical contribution, through our paper we are trying to analyze this phenomena using suitable theoretical tools. 

Moreover, the consequences on the entrepreneurial shift in regional and rural development policies have hardly been discussed. We argue that this is an important point of departure, because although there is a general shift in studies from agricultural to rural development studies, the origins of this shift has only scantily been referred to. In this sense, our article opens up for a future and quite relevant discussion (please look at conclusions especially rows 894-897). 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript entitled “Summer farmers, diversification and rural tourism challenges and opportunities in the wake of the entrepreneurial shift in Sweden (1991-2019)” aims to highlight the challenges and opportunities for implementing an entrepreneurial approach by summer farmers.

General evaluation:

The manuscript has a very interesting theme. The spatial characteristics of rural settlements influence summer farming, and the applied Community-Based Participatory Research method is correct and relevant. In response to the entrepreneurial shift in regional development policies, the results of the manuscript reveal that summer farming in the eyes of the public is often considered to be a cultural practice than an agricultural business, which is informative to policymakers and landscape planners. Below, please find a few specified parts which need further consideration.

Comments:

[10-25]

The abstract is good. Alternatively, it may include a paragraph about the result, and re-write based on this style: Introduction – State of Art- Research aim (question) – Applied method – Result.

[56-61]

Could you expand a little bit this section by literature review, and provide more information if these two implemented regional policies, including job creation and rural tourism, have been successful since 2003 in Sweden?

[68-76]

Please also mention that the summer farms should be adapted to the adverse impact of climate change, which has emerged as a threat to all the services of European rural landscapes. For more information, please see Climate Change and Sustaining Heritage Resources: A Framework for Boosting Cultural and Natural Heritage Conservation in Central Italy.

[131-132]

I would appreciate the endeavor of the authors for achieving long term economic resilience in the farms using biological heritage. However, do you believe if climate-adaptation polices at the local scale play a significant role in this objective? When there is a rapid change in the weather patterns, heat median, heat waves, and seasons which directly impact the cultural farms? In this instance, please see [Climate change challenges to existing cultural heritage policy.]

[168-171]

Could you illustrate this information in diagrams? And present the interview questions in a table?

[231-233]

To this reviewer, this paragraph is a central finding of the manuscript. Hence, I would suggest to omit this paragraph here and shift it to the last parts of the discussion section.

[365-371]

In reference to the mentioned comment for [56-61], could you explain if the regional policies for expanding rural tourism activities have been effective for the entrepreneurial perspective?

Author Response

Here are your comments and our answers. All our responses and comments from all reviewers can be found in the attached document. 

Review Report Form          Reviewer 2

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report

( ) I would like to sign my review report

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required

( ) Moderate English changes required

(x) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required

( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript entitled “Summer farmers, diversification and rural tourism challenges and opportunities in the wake of the entrepreneurial shift in Sweden (1991-2019)” aims to highlight the challenges and opportunities for implementing an entrepreneurial approach by summer farmers.

General evaluation:

The manuscript has a very interesting theme. The spatial characteristics of rural settlements influence summer farming, and the applied Community-Based Participatory Research method is correct and relevant. In response to the entrepreneurial shift in regional development policies, the results of the manuscript reveal that summer farming in the eyes of the public is often considered to be a cultural practice than an agricultural business, which is informative to policymakers and landscape planners. Below, please find a few specified parts which need further consideration.

We agree and acknowledge the comments!

Comments:

[10-25]

The abstract is good. Alternatively, it may include a paragraph about the result, and re-write based on this style: Introduction – State of Art- Research aim (question) – Applied method – Result.

We have done something like this. 

[56-61]

Could you expand a little bit this section by literature review, and provide more information if these two implemented regional policies, including job creation and rural tourism, have been successful since 2003 in Sweden?

This is really a relevant remark. Actually, there are few evaluations of the effectiveness of the job creation and tourism policies. These were quite biased and influenced by the shifts of government during the last two decades. None of these included summer farms specifically. We have elaborated on this and especially between rows 84-100. 

[68-76]

Please also mention that the summer farms should be adapted to the adverse impact of climate change, which has emerged as a threat to all the services of European rural landscapes. For more information, please see Climate Change and Sustaining Heritage Resources: A Framework for Boosting Cultural and Natural Heritage Conservation in Central Italy.

The issue of climate change has not been part of the main focus of the study. However, in the region where summer farming is in use in Sweden today. Climate change will result in slightly hotter temperatures and an increase in rainfall that is predicted to result in a prolonged vegetation period in the region with approximately a month in the next fifty years. Which in turn means summer farming season could be prolonged and the number of grazing animals could be increased. So climate change could be seen as an opportunity for more summer farming, but as a threat to biological heritage since the likely encroachment due to too little grazing pressure will pose a threat to less competitive plants and animals. We added a discussion about climate change in rows 841-855. 

[131-132]

I would appreciate the endeavor of the authors for achieving long term economic resilience in the farms using biological heritage. However, do you believe if climate-adaptation policies at the local scale play a significant role in this objective? When there is a rapid change in the weather patterns, heat median, heat waves, and seasons which directly impact the cultural farms? In this instance, please see [Climate change challenges to existing cultural heritage policy.]

Even if there are attempts to bridge the different interests, the national and regional policies in Sweden generally follows the policy areas, e.g. rural development initiatives do not necessarily include aspects of environmental or climate issues or environmental and cultural subsidies do not take job opportunities in account, something that in Swedish often is referred to as “downpipe” policy. Each governmental agency focuses on their core mandate. There have been attempts to make multipurpose policies, especially when it comes to climate-adaption, but so far I would say the intra-agency interests are stronger than bridging policy areas. In this paper we have focused on the entrepreneurial policies and how the summer farming “businesses” have adapted to them. There are other policy areas that have had effect on the way summer farms are run in practice, like animal health, large carnivores, forestry, cultural buildings, but not to the same extent when it comes to the business arrangements. As the focus of the article really is not climate change we have just written shortly between 841-855, but we feel that we cannot elaborate further on this issue to avoid losing focus. However, this is an excellent topic for a future study.

[168-171]

Could you illustrate this information in diagrams? And present the interview questions in a table?

We have specified participation and themes in the different workshops and activities under methods. This can be found under methods in table 1 and 2. The interview questions when we worked with business model development varied widely and are quite different from case to case, but we have accounted for the themes discussed. 

[231-233]

To this reviewer, this paragraph is a central finding of the manuscript. Hence, I would suggest to omit this paragraph here and shift it to the last parts of the discussion section.

Point taken! It is now moved to the conclusion. 

[365-371]

In reference to the mentioned comment for [56-61], could you explain if the regional policies for expanding rural tourism activities have been effective for the entrepreneurial perspective?

This was asked also by another reviewer. We add the same response: This is really a relevant remark. Actually, there are few evaluations of the effectiveness of the job creation and tourism policies and the few evaluations made were quite biased and influenced by the shifts of government during the last two decades. None of these included summer farms. We have made a comment about this that we hope will make this issue more informative. See rows 94-100.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The article is well-written and the topic, farms that open up to tourism, interesting. However, the article is very Swedish and the authors do not make it very clear what the added value of their paper might be for French farmers or Italian agriturismi, to give just two examples. Moreover, the tourism dimension stays in the background and does not seem to play a significant role in the paper. The conclusions therefore remain very general on one hand and limited to the specific geographical context on the other. This is partially to blame on the survey design. Just 10 interviews, half of them taken among participants to a workshop and therefore not selected ad-random and just a few questionnaires distributes among visitors and volunteers. There is, therefore, no real basis to generalise the results and there a quite some bold conclusions that are supported by anecdotical evidence. A pity, because the paper has merit but it needs, in my view, a broader empirical foundation to make it truly useful for readers of Sustainability.

Author Response

Here you can find your review and our answers, in the attached document you can find all reviews and all our answers.

Submission Date                Reviewer 3

18 May 2020

Date of this review

31 May 2020 09:21:45

Review Report Form

Open Review

(x) I would not like to sign my review report

( ) I would like to sign my review report

English language and style

( ) Extensive editing of English language and style required

( ) Moderate English changes required

(x) English language and style are fine/minor spell check required

( ) I don't feel qualified to judge about the English language and style

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article is well-written and the topic, farms that open up to tourism, interesting. However, the article is very Swedish and the authors do not make it very clear what the added value of their paper might be for French farmers or Italian agriturismi, to give just two examples. 

We agree. We have linked the topic of the article to a wider European discussion and why this is relevant to other countries in Europe. See rows 67-83 and 894-897, See also identified farmers’ strategies under Results.

Moreover, the tourism dimension stays in the background and does not seem to play a significant role in the paper. The conclusions therefore remain very general on one hand and limited to the specific geographical context on the other. 

We have clarified this further and we hope that the current additions make the role of tourism clearer. See especially rows 876-879.

This is partially to blame on the survey design. Just 10 interviews, half of them taken among participants to a workshop and therefore not selected ad-random and just a few questionnaires distributed among visitors and volunteers. There is, therefore, no real basis to generalise the results and there are quite some bold conclusions that are supported by anecdotal evidence. 

This is a justified criticism and we are especially grateful for it. The empirical material is much larger than the in depth interviews. We also have the four business development workshops within the project, but also about a dozen of other workshops and formal meetings with summer farmers and their associations. This interreg-project was our fourth within the area of summer farmers with slightly different angles, therefore the authors have a wide knowledge about topics related to summer farming. We have made an attempt to present this clearer in the methods-section. In addition, we have the notes of the business development support given to individual farmers. We have clarified all of this under “methods” and tables 1 and 2. And rows 172 to 211.

A pity, because the paper has merit but it needs, in my view, a broader empirical foundation to make it truly useful for readers of Sustainability.

We have addressed the shortcoming that you now can find in the paper. We apologize for the sloppy presentation in the first version. We hope that it is now satisfactory for the readers of Sustainability.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

I should repeat my general comments from 1st round: I liked the article, it is an interesting issue. The authors react to all comments.

Nevertheless, on other side. They did not change substantially the  article, the article is written in descriptive style, more as an essay. Nowadays, also sociological researches used to be introduced in more itemized form, including graphics, statistics etc. I would expect at least an estimation how many farmers belong to 5 classes of business strategies  in Results, which were created by authors. The characteristics of those classes brings information as „several informants“,  „some of the farmers“, „other summer farmers“ etc. If these information are correct, the authors should have also information how many are those „some of ...“ These information might bring a little bit more exact base also for future institutional changes.

I proposed also to shorten the introduction and the whole arrticle, but it seems, that the new version is even longer.

In light of all above, I would repeat again, that it is a nice theme, nicely written, Therefore I can not  aand do not want to reject it directly. On other side, the article and the results could be written in more scientific form, but I also assume, that the authors are not ready or not eager to change it substatntially. Therefore, the final decision is on the scientific editor of the Sustainability, how to proceed.

Author Response

We have attached as a file all reviewers comments and our responses to all three. 

Reviewer:

I should repeat my general comments from 1st round: I liked the article, it is an interesting issue. The authors react to all comments.

Nevertheless, on other side. They did not change substantially the article, the article is written in descriptive style, more as an essay. Nowadays, also sociological researches used to be introduced in more itemized form, including graphics, statistics etc. I would expect at least an estimation how many farmers belong to 5 classes of business strategies  in Results, which were created by authors. The characteristics of those classes brings information as „several informants“,  „some of the farmers“, „other summer farmers“ etc. If these information are correct, the authors should have also information how many are those „some of ...“ These information might bring a little bit more exact base also for future institutional changes.

Answer:

Dear reviewer 1. We hope that we have not misunderstood your comments. As you can see, we have added numerical data about number of informants adopting each strategy. We have also added reflections on how well these answers convey with that of public reports and from what was discussed in public meetings, such as ‘Summer Farm Parliaments’.

We have done a conceptual analysis of the different entrepreneurial strategies that the summer farmers have taken, but not to evaluate how common the different strategies are. Furthermore, there aren’t any fixed borders between the different strategies (which we hope is now clearer in the text), where, for instance, a specific number of beef cattle or how much milk that is being processed in order to qualify the summer farm to be included in a certain category is difficult to define. And as we wrote in the text, summer farmers might combine two strategies and in a few cases they have a bit of everything. We hope that you find the solution that we offered satisfactory.

In response the text being ‘descriptive’, we argue that we have used accepted methods in social science studies, there is an analytical approach in the way the study was conducted, in the way the data was processed and in the way the data was analyzed. This has been clearly presented under methods, under conceptual issues as well as in the organization of the results section. And as our topic has not been studied before we see a need to grasp the most important subjects, rather than lifting a single aspect. It is quite common that when there is a critical mass of knowledge to start off from, it is advisable to narrow things down, but when a discussion is being started, at least one or two more thorough texts are needed.

Moreover, there are different traditions on how to write social science articles, in one discipline a large econometric model might be the centerpiece of the article with very little discussion, while in other cases a longer, wider and more ample discussion can be appropriate. And we think that there is no contradiction in writing nicely, it does not make the text and study behind it less scientific.  

Reviewer:

I proposed also to shorten the introduction and the whole article, but it seems, that the new version is even longer.

Answer:

We have struggled hard with this, all reviewers asked for new details in the background and consequently the methodological part resulting in that the length increased slightly. It is hard to add extra information and decrease the length at the same time when nothing was found to be redundant.

One example of additional text is the section about climate change that was asked for by another reviewer, additions to the presentation of policies and much more.

Reviewer:

In light of all above, I would repeat again, that it is a nice theme, nicely written, Therefore I can not  and do not want to reject it directly. On other side, the article and the results could be written in more scientific form, but I also assume, that the authors are not ready or not eager to change it substantially. Therefore, the final decision is on the scientific editor of the Sustainability, how to proceed.

Answer:

As we argued above, different disciplines have different traditions. We argue that in this particular case a more explicit article is needed. In future research, of course, one can refer to this study and narrow down by focusing on one aspect/topic only. And writing nicely does not mean lower quality.

Thank you again for your comments!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Authors improve their research in a very satisfactory way; they answer all the issues highlighted by reviewers.
In my opinion, the paper is now ready to be published.

Author Response

Reviewer 2:

Authors improve their research in a very satisfactory way; they answer all the issues highlighted by reviewers.
In my opinion, the paper is now ready to be published.

Author’s answer:

We’re glad that the corrections were satisfactory. Thanks for your comments!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The paper has improved significantly. I would still ask for an improvement of the methodological part, in particular the way the information about the farmers-entrepreneurs were gathered over the projects that were incorporated was gathered, how the samples relate to the population, and so on. Also the paper allows for an additional strengthening of the tourism dimension. Rural tourism is mentioned explicitly in the title. Last and also least is the fact that picture 4 has been included twice in the text. This is excessive in itself, but it forces me to ask myself what the added value of the included photographs are for the paper: marginal!

Author Response

Please find attached all comments from reviewers and all our answers. 

Here are answers to your comments. 

Reviewer 3: 

The paper has improved significantly. I would still ask for an improvement of the methodological part, in particular the way the information about the farmers-entrepreneurs were gathered over the projects that were incorporated was gathered, how the samples relate to the population, and so on. Also the paper allows for an additional strengthening of the tourism dimension. Rural tourism is mentioned explicitly in the title. Last and also least is the fact that picture 4 has been included twice in the text. This is excessive in itself, but it forces me to ask myself what the added value of the included photographs are for the paper: marginal!

Author’s answer:

1. Methodology: We have added more information on how the study was conducted, and we have also added some numbers to each category under ‘results’. Please see: rows 184-185; rows 247-250; rows 401-405; rows 407-408; rows 433-434; rows 456-459; row 486; row 510; row 582
2. Tourism is important in the identified strategies and we have also highlighted tourism better in the introduction (rows 43 and 49-66) and under conclusions.
3. Pictures: Our intention with the photographs is to give the reader a better idea of the nature of the Swedish summer farms. In the initial round of comments one of the reviewers asked the question of how Swedish summer farming can compare to similar farming types in Italy or other European countries. The pictures aim is to help illustrate what we are talking about.

Thank you again for all your comments!

Author Response File: Author Response.docx