Putting computer models to work for policymakers
While most can agree that developing a model for sustainable agriculture is desirable, not all can agree on how it can be achieved. A number of policies have been adopted at the European as well as Member State level. Analysing the impact of these policies is essential for improving their effectiveness over time. The 'System for Environmental and Agricultural Modelling; Linking European Science and Society' (Seamless) project aimed to deliver the tools necessary to perform such analyses. Considerable EU funding was used to bring together agricultural modelling experts from across the continent to develop an integrated framework. Models covering a wide range of scales, from a single farm all the way up to the global agro-economy, were pooled together. The resulting system empowers its users with the ability to examine potential scenarios applying various kinds of policies and legislative instruments. Economic, environmental and social indicators are then used to evaluate the overall impact. . The key to the integrated framework is that it can provide some insight prior to actual implementation of the planned measures. It is this aspect, the Seamless consortium believes, that will make it invaluable to policymakers at the national as well as European level.
