User:Abratner/Greater Mekong Subregion/Yamcosh Peer Review

General info

Whose work are you reviewing?

User:Abratner

User:Abratner/Greater Mekong Subregion/Bibliography

Link to draft you're reviewing

User:Abratner/Greater Mekong Subregion

Link to the current version of the article (if it exists)

Greater Mekong Subregion

Evaluate the drafted changes

I'll start off by saying I think this is a great contribution to the GMS Wiki page. This subsection was really small and there was a lot of potential for meaningful expansion, which I think your draft accomplishes. It was a good choice tackling this subject rather than the Wiki page for the organization that focuses on the Mekong River area that you were originally going to contribute to.

Lead

I think leaving the lead paragraphs for the "Greater Mekong Subregion" Wiki page and the "Environmental threats" section unchanged is fine. The page's 2 lead paragraphs are too far removed (2 tiers away in structure) from the Deforestation section, that it isn't necessary to mention deforestation there, and the section's 2 lead paragraphs already mention development projects and concerns about forestry.

Content

I really liked your sequence of content. You begin, going off of the original writing, by stating what is happening. Then you transition to why it's happening, and the effects of what's happening. Lastly, you end with responses to what is happening. It is very logical and makes sense. All content is relevant and fairly up-to-date. A couple sources are 10 years old, but I think that's fine, especially for your 5th source. The statistic provided by source #4 (40 million fishermen in the GMS) may be a little out of date, but I would recommend including it anyway. I think this addresses equity gaps because there are a couple mentions of local events, such the hardships of local fisherman in the GMS and CPAs in Cambodia. The rest of this paragraph addresses potentially missing information. For some claims, I think it might be helpful to specify tangible phenomena that are directly observable rather than stating judgements, which lets readers make their own conclusions (most likely the judgements that you put forth here) and makes your writing seem more neutral. For example, if it is mentioned in the article, instead of stating that the water is unhealthy for the fish and human consumption, say what is happening that may make scholars believe that it is (are there increased levels of a certain contaminant, possibly due to runoff?, what contaminant?, etc.). Similarly, how exactly is the riverbank more susceptible to climate change? Is there a way that you can state a trend from the academic journal about the riverbank that will make readers think, the riverbanks are in trouble. You do this well with Malaria, stating straight facts. If you could also briefly state why/how deforestation affects malaria rates, that would be good because I was also wondering that. Additionally, and least in priority, whenever you mention water or the river, I was wondering whether you were referring to all water in the GMS, the main Mekong River, or something else. Maybe you could specify "the water of rivers, tributaries, and lakes" or "the riverbanks of the Mekong" in the second paragraph.

Tone and Balance

Your overall tone is good. I don't have any more suggestions here besides including more specific statements, which I noted in the previous paragraph.

Sources and References

All statements have citations. I'm not going to go through the trouble of fact-checking your work by going through every source because that's a little much. Just make sure you aren't plagiarizing and make sure all content is actually claimed by the authors and attributed to the correct source. The sources are current and written by a large number of authors, which is good. Not all the sources have links but the links for the ones that do all work. The ones that don't have links should still be easily accessible though a web search. I think your sources are very fitting for the content you wrote and for contributing to this Wiki page.

Organization

Your organization is great. I've already touched on most of this. The writing is concise, clear, and easy to read. You have no spelling or grammar errors, although there are a few minor syntax suggestions that I've included at the end of this for you to consider.

Images and Media

No images for this are necessary in my opinion.

Overall impressions

Your contribution will definitely make this Wiki page more complete. I enjoyed reading and analyzing your writing. Overall, it is very good, and I hope it gets published to Wikipedia proper!

Minor edit suggestions for you to consider

Paragraph 1

Second sentence: delete "since then" (implied), delete comma (sentence is not two independent clauses)

Paragraph 2

First sentence: say "including" instead of "such as" (less essay-like), delete colon (unnecessary)

Second sentence: say "the deforestation" instead of "deforestation in the GMS" (this was the subject in the previous sentence, adds variety, maintains and builds on subject from previous sentence), say "impacted" instead of "had impacts on" (more direct, less wordy)

Third sentence: say "The" instead of "Due to deforestation, the" (the cause is already known and there is already an introductory dependent clause to begin each of the first 2 sentences of this paragraph)

See "Content" paragraph of my peer review

Paragraph 3

First sentence: say "for" instead of "of" (not sure about this one but it just sounds better to me), delete "environmental changes such as" (optional, more direct, include it if the source emphasizes environmental changes generally) Second sentence: say "A study that compared malaria rates in the northern and southern regions of Laos found that" instead of "A study compared malaria rates in northern Laos and southern Laos, and found that" (more direct, less emphasis on saying some singular study was conducted and more emphasis on the results, avoid having to say Laos twice soon after each other)

Paragraph 4

First sentence: say "policy is implemented" instead of "policy is put in place and seen through" (more concise)Thank you! - Abby