Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach

Aregash Getachew Hailu; Zerihun Yohannes Amare

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0260817

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionMarch 31, 2021
22 Apr 2021 Decision Letter - László Vasa, Editor PONE-D-21-07822 Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Aregash Getachew Hailu, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by Jun 05 2021 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript: A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'. An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'. If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. 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If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. 7. Thank you for submitting the above manuscript to PLOS ONE. During our internal evaluation of the manuscript, we found significant text overlap between your submission and the following previously published works: - https://www.duo.uio.no/bitstream/handle/10852/44340/final-version.pdf?isAllowed=y&sequence=1 - https://nadre.ethernet.edu.et/record/983?ln=en#.YIIOFpBKg2w We would like to make you aware that copying extracts from previous publications, especially outside the methods section, word-for-word is unacceptable. In addition, the reproduction of text from published reports has implications for the copyright that may apply to the publications. Please revise the manuscript to rephrase the duplicated text, cite your sources, and provide details as to how the current manuscript advances on previous work. Please note that further consideration is dependent on the submission of a manuscript that addresses these concerns about the overlap in text with published work. We will carefully review your manuscript upon resubmission, so please ensure that your revision is thorough. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No ****** 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: The topic of is interesting and relevant. The elaboration and the applied methodology is accurate, however a formal deficiency has to be highlighted: at the tables and figures there are no source indication which is a necessary requirement in case of scientific papers. It can be seen that most probably all (or the majority) of data derived from the primary research of the authors, but even if so, it has to be indicated accordingly. The bibliographic review could be a bit broadened especially a part of the timely issues and challenges of food supply security in Ethiopia and possibly in some other sub-Saharan African countries to make the context more international. The international bibliography is rich in this respect (e.g. https://pubs.iied.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/migrate/14640IIED.pdf or https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf . The authors are also advised to specify and underline the applicability of their new results and findings possibly in a structured list of recommendations. After the suggested improvements were made, the paper can be recommended to be accepted and published. Reviewer #2: The manuscript is technically sound, the data the authors have collected supports the study and the conclusions, thus the study presents the results of original research. What was especially welcomed is the critical approach towards similar program evaluations in Ethiopia and the fact that these previous studies did not include non-beneficiary households in their researches, thus relying on the beneficiary households to interpret their former situation, many times ending up with bias reporting, as the authors put it "respondents recall is often incorrect since it is hard to remember all past incidents correctly, resulting in over or under-reporting of past incidents". According to the submitted information, the authors have not published this study elsewhere. The structure of the paper is logical, starts with introducing the situation first and then presenting the methods and sources of data collection. In this case 188 households were included in the survey, cross-sectional survey data were gathered from these, further key informants interviews and focus group discussion was employed to triangulate results and a Chi-square test was employed to compare the households’ food security status. From the paper we can see that interviews and other analyses are performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail within the paper, the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously. The authors have made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available within tables, explaining those tables as well. Also the conclusion is presented in the required way and data supports the findings, the policy implications are logical and supported by findings. The research meets all applicable standards for the ethics of experimentation and research integrity and the paper adheres to appropriate reporting guidelines and community standards for data availability. The only issue with the recent form of the paper is that it is not presented in an intelligible fashion and a language check is required as well. There are many typos within the text, missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks (not where they are used but are cases where not the quotation mark is used for a citation or the citation is not closed correctly) make it harder to enjoy the paper. My recommendation is to publish the paper after the minor revisions regarding the correction of the language and style mistakes. Reviewer #3: The topic itself is really actual, even nowadays, despite the efforts of the country to deal with food secutity problems. The paper as a whole, the theme would be fine for publishing in PLOS ONE, however, in details, some modifications are needed. - Introduction should be more focused and better structured (highlighting the research questions more clearly, context, objective) - In fact, there is no literature review while it is a must. Authors should write a comprehensive, analytical and critical literature review chapter. In the paper the essential international literature dealing with this topic and/or focusing on Ethiopia should be reviewed. Other countres' cases could be interesting as well (e.g. https://doi.org/10.21163%2FGT_2020.152.16 or the issue of trust is described well https://doi.org/10.1080/08974438.2013.833567) - Metodology chapter should be better focused and more clear, now it seems like unstructured. - English proofreading is needed to provide the expected scientific and right English. ****** 6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r001
Revision 1
16 Jun 2021 Author Response Attached in a separate paper. You can also see here 1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. Response: The authors tried to meet the PLOS ONE’s style requirements. 2. We suggest you thoroughly copyedit your manuscript for language usage, spelling, and grammar. If you do not know anyone who can help you do this, you may wish to consider employing a professional scientific editing service. Response: The authors has been submitted to professional editors and got revised manuscript . Address of the editor: ABOLARIN Gbminiyi, Ph.D. abolaring@babcock.edu.ng Editor, College of Postgraduate Studies, Babcock University, Ogun State, Nigeria 3. PLOS requires an ORCID iD for the corresponding author in Editorial Manager Response: ORCID-Aregash Getachew Hailu https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4822-0470 ORCID-Zerihun Yohannes Amare https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4503-6790 ● The name of the colleague or the details of the professional service that edited your manuscript: see the full details of the professional editor ● A copy of your manuscript showing your changes by either highlighting them or using track changes (uploaded as a supporting information file)---Attached ● A clean copy of the edited manuscript (uploaded as the new manuscript file) Response: Attached 1. We note you have included a table to which you do not refer in the text of your manuscript. Please ensure that you refer to Table 3, 10, 12, in your text; if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the Table. Response: Corrected 2. Please ensure that you refer to Figure 1 in your text as, if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the figure. Response: Corrected 6. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. Response: corrected 7. Thank you for submitting the above manuscript to PLOS ONE. During our internal evaluation of the manuscript, we found significant text overlap between your submission and the following previously published works: We would like to make you aware that copying extracts from previous publications, especially outside the methods section, word-for-word is unacceptable. In addition, the reproduction of text from published reports has implications for the copyright that may apply to the publications. Please revise the manuscript to rephrase the duplicated text, cite your sources, and provide details as to how the current manuscript advances on previous work. Please note that further consideration is dependent on the submission of a manuscript that addresses these concerns about the overlap in text with published work. Response: We will carefully review your manuscript upon resubmission, so please ensure that your revision is thorough. Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ________________________________________ 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ________________________________________ 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No ________________________________________ Response: The language is edited as to the level of standard with accredited editor. The address is described at the beginning of this document. 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: The topic of is interesting and relevant. The elaboration and the applied methodology is accurate, however a formal deficiency has to be highlighted: at the tables and figures there are no source indication which is a necessary requirement in case of scientific papers. It can be seen that most probably all (or the majority) of data derived from the primary research of the authors, but even if so, it has to be indicated accordingly. Response: proofread and Corrected: The bibliographic review could be a bit broadened especially a part of the timely issues and challenges of food supply security in Ethiopia and possibly in some other sub-Saharan African countries to make the context more international. The international bibliography is rich in this respect (e.g. https://pubs.iied.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/migrate/14640IIED.pdf or https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf . The authors are also advised to specify and underline the applicability of their new results and findings possibly in a structured list of recommendations. After the suggested improvements were made, the paper can be recommended to be accepted and published. Response: the suggested and other literatures are included Reviewer #2: The manuscript is technically sound, the data the authors have collected supports the study and the conclusions, thus the study presents the results of original research. What was especially welcomed is the critical approach towards similar program evaluations in Ethiopia and the fact that these previous studies did not include non-beneficiary households in their researches, thus relying on the beneficiary households to interpret their former situation, many times ending up with bias reporting, as the authors put it "respondents recall is often incorrect since it is hard to remember all past incidents correctly, resulting in over or under-reporting of past incidents". According to the submitted information, the authors have not published this study elsewhere. The structure of the paper is logical, starts with introducing the situation first and then presenting the methods and sources of data collection. In this case 188 households were included in the survey, cross-sectional survey data were gathered from these, further key informants interviews and focus group discussion was employed to triangulate results and a Chi-square test was employed to compare the households’ food security status. From the paper we can see that interviews and other analyses are performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail within the paper, the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously. The authors have made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available within tables, explaining those tables as well. Also the conclusion is presented in the required way and data supports the findings, the policy implications are logical and supported by findings. The research meets all applicable standards for the ethics of experimentation and research integrity and the paper adheres to appropriate reporting guidelines and community standards for data availability. The only issue with the recent form of the paper is that it is not presented in an intelligible fashion and a language check is required as well. There are many typos within the text, missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks (not where they are used but are cases where not the quotation mark is used for a citation or the citation is not closed correctly) make it harder to enjoy the paper. My recommendation is to publish the paper after the minor revisions regarding the correction of the language and style mistakes. Response: The authors tried to improve the presentation styles and the language was also proofread by accredited editor. Reviewer #3: The topic itself is really actual, even nowadays, despite the efforts of the country to deal with food secutity problems. The paper as a whole, the theme would be fine for publishing in PLOS ONE, however, in details, some modifications are needed. - Introduction should be more focused and better structured (highlighting the research questions more clearly, context, objective) - In fact, there is no literature review while it is a must. Authors should write a comprehensive, analytical and critical literature review chapter. In the paper the essential international literature dealing with this topic and/or focusing on Ethiopia should be reviewed. Other countres' cases could be interesting as well (e.g. https://doi.org/10.21163%2FGT_2020.152.16 or the issue of trust is described well https://doi.org/10.1080/08974438.2013.833567) - Metodology chapter should be better focused and more clear, now it seems like unstructured. - English proofreading is needed to provide the expected scientific and right English. ________________________________________ Response: The authors tried to maintain the journal formalities and include the literature as suggested. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to reviewer.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r002
11 Jul 2021 Decision Letter - László Vasa, Editor PONE-D-21-07822R1 Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Aregash Getachew Hailu, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by 10.08.2021. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript: A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'. An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'. If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, László Vasa, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: (No Response) Reviewer #3: (No Response) ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #3: Partly ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: The bibliographic extension was partially done, however it could be still further broadened, like https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf , https://ojs.lib.unideb.hu/apstract/article/view/6217/5834 . The authors were also advised to specify and underline the applicability of their new results and findings in a structured list of recommendations, but it is still missing from the revised version. In my opinion, these improvements may merely increase the value of the paper. After the suggested recommendations were implemented the paper can be published. Reviewer #3: The authors did not made the reqommended improvements so I can't accept this paper for publication in its present form. I advise to check my comments and recommendations of the first review round again. ****** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #3: No [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r003
Revision 2
10 Aug 2021 Author Response 1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. Response: The authors tried to meet the PLOS ONE’s style requirements. 2. We suggest you thoroughly copyedit your manuscript for language usage, spelling, and grammar. If you do not know anyone who can help you do this, you may wish to consider employing a professional scientific editing service. Response: The authors has been submitted to professional editors and got revised manuscript . Address of the editor: ABOLARIN Gbminiyi, Ph.D. abolaring@babcock.edu.ng Editor, College of Postgraduate Studies, Babcock University, Ogun State, Nigeria 3. PLOS requires an ORCID iD for the corresponding author in Editorial Manager Response: ORCID-Aregash Getachew Hailu https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4822-0470 ORCID-Zerihun Yohannes Amare https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4503-6790 ● The name of the colleague or the details of the professional service that edited your manuscript: see the full details of the professional editor ● A copy of your manuscript showing your changes by either highlighting them or using track changes (uploaded as a supporting information file)---Attached ● A clean copy of the edited manuscript (uploaded as the new manuscript file) Response: Attached 1. We note you have included a table to which you do not refer in the text of your manuscript. Please ensure that you refer to Table 3, 10, 12, in your text; if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the Table. Response: Corrected 2. Please ensure that you refer to Figure 1 in your text as, if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the figure. Response: Corrected 6. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. Response: corrected 7. Thank you for submitting the above manuscript to PLOS ONE. During our internal evaluation of the manuscript, we found significant text overlap between your submission and the following previously published works: We would like to make you aware that copying extracts from previous publications, especially outside the methods section, word-for-word is unacceptable. In addition, the reproduction of text from published reports has implications for the copyright that may apply to the publications. Please revise the manuscript to rephrase the duplicated text, cite your sources, and provide details as to how the current manuscript advances on previous work. Please note that further consideration is dependent on the submission of a manuscript that addresses these concerns about the overlap in text with published work. Response: We will carefully review your manuscript upon resubmission, so please ensure that your revision is thorough. Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ________________________________________ 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ________________________________________ 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No ________________________________________ Response: The language is edited as to the level of standard with accredited editor. The address is described at the beginning of this document. 5. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: The topic of is interesting and relevant. The elaboration and the applied methodology is accurate, however a formal deficiency has to be highlighted: at the tables and figures there are no source indication which is a necessary requirement in case of scientific papers. It can be seen that most probably all (or the majority) of data derived from the primary research of the authors, but even if so, it has to be indicated accordingly. Response: proofread and Corrected: The bibliographic review could be a bit broadened especially a part of the timely issues and challenges of food supply security in Ethiopia and possibly in some other sub-Saharan African countries to make the context more international. The international bibliography is rich in this respect (e.g. https://pubs.iied.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/migrate/14640IIED.pdf or https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf . The authors are also advised to specify and underline the applicability of their new results and findings possibly in a structured list of recommendations. After the suggested improvements were made, the paper can be recommended to be accepted and published. Response: the suggested and other literatures are included Reviewer #2: The manuscript is technically sound, the data the authors have collected supports the study and the conclusions, thus the study presents the results of original research. What was especially welcomed is the critical approach towards similar program evaluations in Ethiopia and the fact that these previous studies did not include non-beneficiary households in their researches, thus relying on the beneficiary households to interpret their former situation, many times ending up with bias reporting, as the authors put it "respondents recall is often incorrect since it is hard to remember all past incidents correctly, resulting in over or under-reporting of past incidents". According to the submitted information, the authors have not published this study elsewhere. The structure of the paper is logical, starts with introducing the situation first and then presenting the methods and sources of data collection. In this case 188 households were included in the survey, cross-sectional survey data were gathered from these, further key informants interviews and focus group discussion was employed to triangulate results and a Chi-square test was employed to compare the households’ food security status. From the paper we can see that interviews and other analyses are performed to a high technical standard and are described in sufficient detail within the paper, the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously. The authors have made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available within tables, explaining those tables as well. Also the conclusion is presented in the required way and data supports the findings, the policy implications are logical and supported by findings. The research meets all applicable standards for the ethics of experimentation and research integrity and the paper adheres to appropriate reporting guidelines and community standards for data availability. The only issue with the recent form of the paper is that it is not presented in an intelligible fashion and a language check is required as well. There are many typos within the text, missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks (not where they are used but are cases where not the quotation mark is used for a citation or the citation is not closed correctly) make it harder to enjoy the paper. My recommendation is to publish the paper after the minor revisions regarding the correction of the language and style mistakes. Response: The authors tried to improve the presentation styles and the language was also proofread by accredited editor. Reviewer #3: The topic itself is really actual, even nowadays, despite the efforts of the country to deal with food secutity problems. The paper as a whole, the theme would be fine for publishing in PLOS ONE, however, in details, some modifications are needed. - Introduction should be more focused and better structured (highlighting the research questions more clearly, context, objective) - In fact, there is no literature review while it is a must. Authors should write a comprehensive, analytical and critical literature review chapter. In the paper the essential international literature dealing with this topic and/or focusing on Ethiopia should be reviewed. Other countres' cases could be interesting as well (e.g. https://doi.org/10.21163%2FGT_2020.152.16 or the issue of trust is described well https://doi.org/10.1080/08974438.2013.833567) - Metodology chapter should be better focused and more clear, now it seems like unstructured. - English proofreading is needed to provide the expected scientific and right English. ________________________________________ Response: The authors tried to maintain the journal formalities and include the literature as suggested. The research questions and objectives are listed in a structured way. Second time reviewers’ comments Reviewer #1: The bibliographic extension was partially done, however it could be still further broadened, like https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf , https://ojs.lib.unideb.hu/apstract/article/view/6217/5834 . The authors were also advised to specify and underline the applicability of their new results and findings in a structured list of recommendations, but it is still missing from the revised version. In my opinion, these improvements may merely increase the value of the paper. After the suggested recommendations were implemented the paper can be published. Response: The authors appreciate the comments of the reviewer and tried to expand using recent published papers and reviewers suggested articles. Reviewer #3: The authors did not made the recommended improvements so I can't accept this paper for publication in its present form. I advise to check my comments and recommendations of the first review round again. Response: We revised based on the previous comments and suggestions. If we go beyond this, and add more literature, the page number will be increased and out of the PLOS ONE submission guideline. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to reviewer.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r004
31 Aug 2021 Decision Letter - László Vasa, Editor PONE-D-21-07822R2 Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Hailu, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by 15.09.2021. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript: A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'. An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'. If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, László Vasa, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. Additional Editor Comments (if provided): [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #2: (No Response) Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #1: The Authors repeatedly disregarded the reviewer's advise. The smaller problem is that they did not incorporate the suggested sources into the bibliographic review, but the structured and possibly detailed chapter of conclusions and suggestions is still missing (even though the original chapter was slightly extended). This part could have highlighted also the new scientific findings of the paper. Another - formal - problem is that the authors did not indicate the sources of data in case of most Tables in the paper. It is very much necessary in case of scientific papers, even if the data were eventually collected by the authors' primary research. Reviewer #2: After reading the new submission (corrected version) i still can see many of those mistakes which are not acceptable for an academic journal. There are still many typos within the text, the ones which have been highlighted already (missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks). These has to be corrected before acceptance. Reviewer #3: The authors accapted all of my recommendations for improving the paper and modified/upgraded it in the right way. The paper is more sound in its current form, so I recommend it for publications without changes. ****** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r005
Revision 3
11 Oct 2021 Author Response Reviewer #1: The Authors repeatedly disregarded the reviewer's advise. The smaller problem is that they did not incorporate the suggested sources into the bibliographic review, but the structured and possibly detailed chapter of conclusions and suggestions is still missing (even though the original chapter was slightly extended). This part could have highlighted also the new scientific findings of the paper. Another - formal - problem is that the authors did not indicate the sources of data in case of most Tables in the paper. It is very much necessary in case of scientific papers, even if the data were eventually collected by the authors' primary research. Authors’ response: 1.The “reviewer one” suggested to include these two unrelated papers: 1.1 https://re.volsu.ru/eng/contacts/8_Nad_i_dr.pmd.pdf 1.2. https://ojs.lib.unideb.hu/apstract/article/view/6217/5834 These suggested materials are not related to our article and we are unable to add. 2. Conclusion and recommendations are already corrected based on the first session reviewers comments and you can check the first submission of the manuscript with track change 3. The sources of the data are cited in all Tables and acknowledged. Reviewer #2: After reading the new submission (corrected version) i still can see many of those mistakes which are not acceptable for an academic journal. There are still many typos within the text, the ones which have been highlighted already (missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks). These has to be corrected before acceptance. Response: all typos and inappropriate quotation marks are corrected Reviewer #3: The authors accapted all of my recommendations for improving the paper and modified/upgraded it in the right way. The paper is more sound in its current form, so I recommend it for publications without changes. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to reviewer.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r006
3 Nov 2021 Decision Letter - László Vasa, Editor PONE-D-21-07822R3Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approachPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Hailu, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process. Please submit your revised manuscript by 10.11.2021. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file. Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript: A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'. A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'. An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'. If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, László Vasa, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Journal Requirements: Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice. [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation. Reviewer #2: (No Response) Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified. Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here. Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 6. Review Comments to the Author Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters) Reviewer #2: After reading the submission (the newly submitted version), though the authors claimed they have crrected everything, i still can see many mistakes which are, in my understanding, not acceptable for an academic journal. There are still many typos within the text, the ones which have been highlighted already (missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks). These has to be corrected before acceptance. Just a few examples to help the authors: Table 9 is numbered as Table 1. No coherency in naming the tables, See: 'Table 11:' vs. 'Table 12' (few times with a colon, sometimes without it) Introduction part for example with missing spaces: 'Africa(Gollin 2014)'; 'households(FAO 2017)'; '(2011)impact'; 'world(United Nations 2000)' These are all over the text. Reviewer #3: The authors improved the paper in accordance with the reviewers' recommendations. After several rounds, the paper is now eligible for the PLOS ONE standard and can be published without any further changes. ****** 7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #2: No Reviewer #3: No [NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.] While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r007
Revision 4
10 Nov 2021 Author Response Response to reviewer Reviewer #2: After reading the submission (the newly submitted version), though the authors claimed they have corrected everything, i still can see many mistakes which are, in my understanding, not acceptable for an academic journal. There are still many typos within the text, the ones which have been highlighted already (missing spaces and the incorrect use of quotation marks). These has to be corrected before acceptance. Response: We tried to read seriously and address all the comments. See the track change for evidence Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to reviewers November 2021.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r008
18 Nov 2021 Decision Letter - László Vasa, Editor Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach PONE-D-21-07822R4 Dear Dr. Hailu, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, László Vasa, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Reviewers' comments: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r009
Formally Accepted
14 Dec 2021 Acceptance Letter - László Vasa, Editor PONE-D-21-07822R4 Impact of productive safety net program on food security of beneficiary households in western Ethiopia: A matching estimator approach Dear Dr. Hailu: I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Prof. Dr. László Vasa Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0260817.r010

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