PONE-D-24-15225A study of the impact of urban business credit environment on environmental pollutionPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Wu,

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.

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ACADEMIC EDITOR: The submission requires further revisions with reference to both the theoretical and quantitative framework.

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Stefan Cristian Gherghina, PhD. Habil.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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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

Reviewer #4: No

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: I Don't Know

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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

Reviewer #4: No

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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: No

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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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: Dear authors

This study empirically analyses the impact of commercial credit on the urban environment by means of a spatial econometric model for China in the period 2010-2021. In doing so, spatial spillover effects and heterogeneity across regions are taken into account. The analysis finds an inverse U-shaped relationship between commercial credit and the urban environment, confirming spatial spillover effects and heterogeneity between regions. Robustness to these results is also tested. With sustainable finance gaining attention as a climate change measure, the results of this study are expected to provide useful policy recommendations. However, the explanations of previous studies, the interpretation of the results and the multiple typos significantly undermine the academic value of this study. Improvements to these are therefore suggested as follows.

The discovery of an inverted U-shaped relationship between business credit and the urban environment is a key result of this study. Nevertheless, in the introduction, the authors refer to previous studies on business credit improving the urban environment, but not to previous studies on its worsening the urban environment. Not only in the Literature Review in Section 2, but also in the Introduction in Section 1, an explanation should be provided regarding business credit worsening the environment and increasing pollution by citing relevant studies.

In Table 6, the indirect effects of In(credit) and In2(credit) are just under three times more effective than their direct effects. In general, the direct effects are considered to have larger values than the indirect effects. A rational explanation should be provided for this result.

The total effect of Model 1 in Table 7 is nearly 190, and the size of the value is outstanding compared to the other results. Why are the value so large?

The spatial weight matrix in 3.2.3 should also be accompanied by a concise explanation, rather than just stating the formula.

In the conclusion, the limitations of this study should be stated.

The paper is very difficult to read due to the typos and formatting flaws as pointed out below. The entire paper should be reviewed to reduce these errors.

In the references, the name of the journal is not mentioned.

In Tables 3 and 4, Chinese words are included and should be corrected into English.

In 3.2.3, the formula contains unnecessary small arrows, which should be deleted.

On page 2, line 27, ‘western regions. however,’ is a period typo. In addition, there is no period typo at the end of this sentence.

On page 8, line 173, ‘Exacerbating’ begins with a capital letter, even though it is in mid-sentence.

On page 26, line 465, the word ‘pollution.’ does not require a period.

On page 32, line 556, ‘Increasing’ starts with a capital letter, despite being in the sentence.

On page 34, line 582, ‘The urban’ is capitalised at the beginning of the sentence, even though it is in the middle of the sentence.

Reviewer #2: Dear author(s),

I had the opportunity to read and revised your article.

I believe your work coherent as the Journal “PLOS ONE”, regarding an interesting topic not fully investigated in the literature until now. However, I have some suggestions and minor concerns that may be improve the quality of your work. You can find additional information in the attached revision file.

With best wishes in the publishing process.

Reviewer #3: Review of manuscript "A study of the impact of urban business credit environment on environmental pollution" (PONE-D-24-15225). The study highlights a positive spatial association between urban pollution and commercial credit indices in China; with an inverted "U" shape relationship indicating that improving the urban business credit environment can reduce pollution once a threshold is reached. Regional variations exist in the impact of business credit on environmental deterioration, emphasizing the need for tailored strategies to strengthen commercial credit systems and promote environmental sustainability in different regions.

• More detailed suggestions and comments are presented as follows:

1. Line 53 – 55: Previous research has demonstrated the significant influence social credit plays in improving the urban environment. Please cite the related research articles for in-depth understanding.

2. Section 1 Introduction: The section is quite lengthy and splitting the section into various sub-sections such as Introduction, Literature Review, Research gap, Scope of the study, and Research questions will be more helpful.

3. In the introduction, you need to connect the current state of research to your paper goals. Please follow the literature review by a clear and concise state of the art analysis. This should clearly show the knowledge gaps identified and link them to your paper goals. Also, please provide the organization of the paper in the last paragraph of the introduction.

4. Section 4 Empirical results and analysis: Would you consider splitting the fourth section, into two parts, Results and Discussion? At present, the length of the results section is too long, which is not conducive to grasping the key points.

5. Section 5 Conclusion and policy implications are too long, and it is recommended that the main conclusions be distilled and streamlined.

6. The sub-section 5.2 Policy Recommendations: It can be included in the separate sub-section into Discussion section.

Reviewer #4: The Manuscript titles A study of the impact of urban business credit environment on environmental pollution(PONE-D-24-15225) tries to investigate the impact based on 276 cities.in China.

following are the comments for the authors.

1. The draft is loosely framed and lacks the discussion section completely

2. The data source and year of data is missing( no citations provided).

3. Spatial mapping of the 276 selected cities can really add value to the paper. The authors should adopt appropriate methods and tools for the same.

4. A Methodology chart is not included in the paper …which is a must.

5. Same theme is repeated several times in the paper and reiterated without proper citations.

6. Only 26 references make the whole research very subjective.

7. This paper needs a complete overhauling.

A major revision of the draft is essential.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: No

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A study of the impact of urban business credit environment on environmental pollution

PONE-D-24-15225R1

Dear Dr. Wu,

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.

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Kind regards,

Stefan Cristian Gherghina, PhD. Habil.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

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 #3: All comments have been addressed

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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: Yes

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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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: (No Response)

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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

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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: Dear author.

This paper appears to have been appropriately revised in line with the reviewers' comments.

I would therefore like to leave further decisions to the Editor-in-Chief.

Sincerely.

Reviewer #3: I am satisfied with the revisions made by the authors and I am happy to recommend this manuscript for publication in PLOS ONE.

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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

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