Policy Relevant Modelling: Relationships Between Land Use, and Farmer Decision Processes
Authors
Tim Oxley
Department of Environmental Science & Technology, Imperial College London
P. Jeffrey
School of Industrial and Manufacturing Science, Cranfield University
M. Lemon
International Ecotechnology Research Centre, CranÆeld University, Beds, UK
Keywords:
modelling, water, policy relevance, human decision making.
Abstract
This paper presents a policy-relevant model based approach to assessing land-use change that is based upon a number of transdisciplinary mechanisms. We report the development of a modelling platform which supports analysis of the interactions between slope, aquifer, and catchment dynamics, together with the actions of farmers as they change their crop profiles and consequently their water needs. The master-equation based farmer decision making model, driven by rule based decision trees derived within the context of a conceptual framework which accommodates both the human and natural processes and their interdependencies, is central to the method presented in this paper. Our conclusions relate to both the function and process of integrative assessment and we present characteristic model outputs to highlight the interactions between the farmers and their natural environment.
