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Biblioteca Land-use change trajectories up to 2050: insights from a global agro-economic model comparison

Land-use change trajectories up to 2050: insights from a global agro-economic model comparison

Land-use change trajectories up to 2050: insights from a global agro-economic model comparison

Resource information

Date of publication
Diciembre 2014
Resource Language
ISBN / Resource ID
handle:10568/52166
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Changes in agricultural land use have important implications for environmental services. Previous studies of agricultural land-use futures have been published indicating large uncertainty due to different model assumptions and methodologies. In this article we present a first comprehensive comparison of global agro-economic models that have harmonized drivers of population, GDP, and biophysical yields. The comparison allows us to ask two research questions: (1) How much cropland will be used under different socioeconomic and climate change scenarios? (2) How can differences in model results be explained? The comparison includes four partial and six general equilibrium models that differ in how they model land supply and amount of potentially available land. We analyze results of two different socioeconomic scenarios and three climate scenarios (one with constant climate). Most models (7 out of 10) project an increase of cropland of 10–25% by 2050 compared to 2005 (under constant climate), but one model projects a decrease. Pasture land expands in some models, which increase the threat on natural vegetation further. Across all models most of the cropland expansion takes place in South America and sub-Saharan Africa. In general, the strongest differences in model results are related to differences in the costs of land expansion, the endogenous productivity responses, and the assumptions about potential cropland.

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Authors and Publishers

Author(s), editor(s), contributor(s)

Nelson, Gerald C.
Valin, Hugo
Hasegawa, Tomoko
Tabeau, Andrzej
van Meijl, Hans
Heyhoe, Edwina
Kyle, Page
Schmitz, Christoph
Blanc, Elodie
van der Mensbrugghe, Dominique
Gurgel, Angelo
Kavallari, Aikaterini
Popp, Alexander
Sands, Ronald D.
Mason-D'Croz, D.
Lampe M. von
Havlik, Petr
Fujimori, Shinichiro
Wise, Marshall

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