Exploring the Potential of Social Farmers’ Networking as a Leverage for Inclusive Tourism

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

It is an original and interesting team work ,  based on a qualitative research project, conducted  in the Italian Marche Region  in 2021  and 2022 online with 12 in-depths interviews. This region  needs the  development of new innovative forms of tourism as an inclusive activity . The Authors stress the importance of the use of network dimension , which is crucial for social enterprises . They show how rural social entrepreneurs can use tourism to generate inclusion . One could stress even  more the specificity and the forms  of network dimension as a tool of cooperation between these entrepreneurs .

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We sincerely thank you for your time and dedication to this review. Your valuable suggestions contributed to improving and enriching our study.

In this section, we answer the critical points you stressed for this research:

Point 1: One could stress even more the specificity and the forms of network dimension as a tool of cooperation between these entrepreneurs.

Response 1: Thank you for stressing this point. We have further specified the forms of network dimensions at the end of the literature review by summarising the main elements emerging from the existing studies. We also did it in the conclusions. In the latter case, we stressed the characteristics that a social farming tourism network might have, according to the results of our exploratory research.

Please, refer to lines 232 - 239 and lines 658 - 663

 

We are available to hear back from you and to provide further clarification if needed.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors, 

I congratulate the idea of the paper and the topic. Nevertheless I am not sure if the case study you analysed can be representative and one can say that it's a general thought? The idea of networking and social entrepreneurships is valuable and needed, though.

There are small things to correct/complete:

-  you write: "Tourism literature, which usually focuses on traditional hospitality.." - I can't agree with it; I suggest to add some literature review from the area of transportation in tourism, gastronomy in tourism, sharing economy in tourism branches;

- you write: "Although social enterprises have generally been underestimated in tourism planning, they play a crucial role in making tourism sustainable" - I'm not sure if the role is crucial, I think local decision-makers play a significant role in sustainable tourism development; - you can add this in the paper, please;

- you can also add some information about CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility);

- research hypotheses are not clearly stated; I'm not sure if they are stated at all?

- poor references concerning tourism economy vs. sustainability;

- add some references concerning CSR

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We sincerely thank you for your time and dedication to this review. Your valuable suggestions contributed to improving and enriching our study.

 

In this section, we answer the critical points you stressed for this research:

Point 1:  I am not sure if the case study you analysed can be representative and one can say that it's a general thought? The idea of networking and social entrepreneurships is valuable and needed, though.

Response to Point 1: from our perspective, social farming represents one of the most relevant cases of social entrepreneurship for developing inclusive tourism experiences. Following Biddulph’s (2018) research highlighting the role of social enterprises in rural areas, we decided to consider social farming as a case study. As you point out, the results of this research cannot be generalised to the entire field of social entrepreneurship. Although the diverse sample of social businesses (farms and social cooperatives) is one of the strengths of this research, the study should be replicated in other social entrepreneurial contexts and geographies. These elements were further detailed among the study's limitations and indicated as possible areas for future research.

Please, refer to lines 668 - 671.

Point 2: There are small things to correct/complete:

A. you write: "Tourism literature, which usually focuses on traditional hospitality.." - I can't agree with it; I suggest to add some literature review from the area of transportation in tourism, gastronomy in tourism, sharing economy in tourism branches;

Response to Point 2.A.: we intended to focus on existing research on working conditions in tourism hospitality, which has been mainly conducted in traditional hospitality and less in non-mainstreamed contexts, such as agri-tourism and farm stays. To avoid misunderstanding, we reformulated the text accordingly. Please, refer to lines 44-45

B. you write: "Although social enterprises have generally been underestimated in tourism planning, they play a crucial role in making tourism sustainable" - I'm not sure if the role is crucial, I think local decision-makers play a significant role in sustainable tourism development; - you can add this in the paper, please;

Response to Point 2.B.: Thanks for stressing this point. As you suggest, policymakers, as decision-makers, are critical to make tourism sustainable. We provided some clarification in the text by stressing the importance of social entrepreneurs in creating more sustainable (and inclusive) tourism activities to be considered by policymakers to make tourism more sustainable.

Please, refer to lines 49 - 58

 

Point 3: you can also add some information about CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility);

 

Response to Point 3: Some literature on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been included as a theoretical framework for rural social entrepreneurship. We referred to literature from Oragens-Cezarino et al. (2022), Matten and Moon (2008), Campos et al. (2020), Chandra et al. (2021), Madanaguli et al. (2022), to finish with Higgins-Desbiolles (2020) for the need of more CSR generated by the recent Covid-19 pandemics. The text has been reformulated accordingly.

Please, refer to lines 88 - 99

 

Point 4: There are small things to correct/complete:

A. research hypotheses are not clearly stated; I'm not sure if they are stated at all?

Response to Point 4.A.: thanks for stressing this point. The two research hypotheses deriving from the literature have been more clearly stated. Please, consult the text after the literature review at lines 240 - 244. Research hypotheses also have been repeated in the section of the conclusions of this research. Please, refer to lines 589 - 590.

B. poor references concerning tourism economy vs. sustainability;

Response to Point 4.B.: Some literature concerning tourism economy and sustainability has been provided to better frame the our research, both in terms of policy recommendations (OECD, 2020; UNWTO, 2020, specific for rural areas) and academic literature (Postma et al., 2017; Aquino, 2022, this last one specific on the impacts of social entrepreneurship). Please, refer to lines 32 -34 of the introduction and 82 – 88 and 102 – 105 of the literature review.

Point 5: There are small things to correct/complete: add some references concerning CSR

Response to Point 5: please, refer to point 4

 

 

 

We are available to hear back from you and to provide further clarification if needed.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

This is very interesting and good paper, based on a qualitative direct investigation on twelve social enterprises located in Marche Region in Italy. I appreciated many things of this paper.

Objectives are clearly stated since the beginning using research questions. All parts of the paper are well balanced: I appreciated a lot the structure and the coherence of the paper. The literature analysis is good and rich as well. The methodology (case study approach based on direct interviews, and thematic analysis of the transcripts) has been applied appropriately and rigorously, and it is explained and presented clearly and orderly. I also liked the presentation and discussion of the results, using direct quotations.  

I have anyway few suggestions which, in my opinion, may improve further the paper.

Recently, some studies about social farming (SF) in highly peripheral and marginal regions have been conducted in Italy and out of Italy, where several issues emerge, particularly as concerns the importance of SF and of the networks they created for highly isolated communities, and the contextual barriers (institutional, infrastructural, etc.)  which hinder cooperation and social entrepreneurship in these areas. I would suggest taking these works into consideration in your paper. See for example some studies on Trentino-Alto Adige, dealing with SF and social innovation (Gramm, Hoffman & Cattivelli, 2019; Gramm, Torre & Membretti, 2020; Gretter, Dalla Torre, Maino & Omizzolo, 2019); some investigations in Calabria (Musolino, Crea, & Marcianò, 2018; Musolino, Distaso, & Marcianò, 2020); a very recent work on Aosta valley (Fazari and Musolino, 2023); lastly some works on the Pyrenees mountains (López-i-Gelats, Milán, & Bartolomé, 2011; Barnaud & Couix, 2020). 

I also suggest improving the reflections on the policy implications of your work, trying to be more specific about how these results might be taken into consideration in policy and planning activities. Moreover, I would suggest being also more specific about the next steps of the future research following this interesting work.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We sincerely thank you for your time and dedication to this review. Your valuable suggestions contributed to improving and enriching our study.

In this section, we answer the critical points you stressed for this research:

 

Point 1: Recently, some studies about social farming (SF) in highly peripheral and marginal regions have been conducted in Italy and out of Italy, where several issues emerge, particularly as concerns the importance of SF and of the networks they created for highly isolated communities, and the contextual barriers (institutional, infrastructural, etc.)  which hinder cooperation and social entrepreneurship in these areas. I would suggest taking these works into consideration in your paper. See for example some studies on Trentino-Alto Adige, dealing with SF and social innovation (Gramm, Hoffman & Cattivelli, 2019; Gramm, Torre & Membretti, 2020; Gretter, Dalla Torre, Maino & Omizzolo, 2019); some investigations in Calabria (Musolino, Crea, & Marcianò, 2018; Musolino, Distaso, & Marcianò, 2020); a very recent work on Aosta valley (Fazari and Musolino, 2023); lastly some works on the Pyrenees mountains (López-i-Gelats, Milán, & Bartolomé, 2011; Barnaud & Couix, 2020). 

Response 1: Thank you so much for your valuable suggestions on social farming. We extended the list of refereces for this study, including Gretter et al. (2019), Fazari and Musolino (2022), Musolino (2020), Nazzaro et al. (2021), López-i-Gelats (2011), Gramm et al. (2019). Therefore, we modified the text accordingly, to give emphasis to drivers and barriers of highly marginalised areas, as suggested. Please, refer to lines 182 – 184, 201 – 202, 209 – 223 in the section concerning the literature review. Results have also been commented according to the new literature. Refer in particular to lines 428 – 431, 463.

Point 2: I also suggest improving the reflections on the policy implications of your work, trying to be more specific about how these results might be taken into consideration in policy and planning activities.

Response to Point 2: Thank you for stressing this point. Policy implications have been added to the conclusion of this research. Two main aspects are stressed. The first one concerns the need to consider different social farming businesses as tourism providers, besides the educational farms that, by law (national 141/2015) are formally recognized for their educational mission. The second one concerns the need for regional tourism policies to strengthen collaborations with social and agricultural policies which regulate social farming experiences. Accordingly, we provided some modifications to the manuscript.

Please, refer to the lines 643 - 651.

Point 3: Moreover, I would suggest being also more specific about the next steps of the future research following this interesting work.

 

Response to point 3: Considering the exploratory nature of this study, future research could consider investigating existing networks and also focus on the viewpoint of marginalized groups, alongside with social entrepreneurial perspective. Future research should also be carried out in social entrepreneurial context different than social farming and in different geographies.

Please, refer to lines 652 – 657, and 668 – 671.

Concerning the specific topic of this social farming network, future research should be extended to the ecosystemic dimension of social farming tourism experiences by involving social farms and other public and private actors to work together on the characteristics that social farming tourism might have. Participatory approaches (e.g., focus groups) and the use of the business model canvas can be considered useful operational tools, among others.

Please, refer to lines 658 - 667

We are available to hear back from you and to provide further clarification if needed.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf