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WASCAL (West African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use). Work Package 6.2 Agent-based models for integrated assessment
Project
Project code: keine Angabe
Contract period: 01.10.2012
- 30.04.2016
Purpose of research: Inventory & Assessment
The overall aim of WASCAL is to identify resilient and adaptive/adapted land-use systems and how these can be fostered. We substantiated this aim through the proposed work package by the sub-goal to identify resilient long-term land-use strategies of land users. As resilience is largely determined by the dynamics and feedbacks within and between the social, the economic and the environmental spheres, an integrated modelling approach is required that can combine them. We suggest this to be agent-based modelling as it has this capacity, as well as the ability to simulate emergent phenomena such as resilience. However, the weakness of agent-based modeling is its susceptibility to emergent errors, induced by the great flexibility in agent design, especially that of human agents. In this work package, we therefore propose an agent-based model framework that i) holds the level of detailedness is at a possible minimum, ii) rigorously designs human agents on the basis of social-science insight, and that iii) constrains the model by expert-based macro-scale scenarios. When implemented according to this framework, the final agent-based model will have the ability to simulate the human-environment system dynamics in response to external climatic shocks via scenarios, given selected present or alternative long-term land-use strategies. The indicators to assess system performance and thus resilience will comprise ecological ecosystem services, economic welfare indicators, and cultural ecosystem services, thus providing a tool for integrated assessment.
Section overview
Subjects
- Agricultural Sociology
- Agroeconomics
- Climate Change
Collaborative Project
WASCAL (West African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use) Research Program
Framework programme
BMBF - FONA (Research for Sustainable Development) - Research Framework Programme for Sustainability