IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jlands/v4y2015i2p475-512d50797.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region

Author

Listed:
  • Julia Maria Brändle

    (Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering, Planning of Landscape and Urban Systems, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Stefano-Franscini-Platz 5, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland
    Department of Environmental Systems Science, Natural and Social Science Interface, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Universitätsstrasse 22, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

  • Gaby Langendijk

    (Earth System Science Group, Wageningen University and Research Center, Droevendaalsesteeg 4, 6708 PB Wageningen, The Netherlands)

  • Simon Peter

    (Department of Environmental Systems Science, Agricultural Economics, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Sonneggstrasse 33, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland)

  • Sibyl Hanna Brunner

    (Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering, Planning of Landscape and Urban Systems, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Stefano-Franscini-Platz 5, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland)

  • Robert Huber

    (Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Zürcherstrasse 111, 8903 Birmensdorf, Switzerland
    These authors contributed equally to this work.)

Abstract

Land abandonment and the subsequent re-forestation are important drivers behind the loss of ecosystem services in mountain regions. Agent-based models can help to identify global change impacts on farmland abandonment and can test policy and management options to counteract this development. Realigning the representation of human decision making with time scales of ecological processes such as reforestation presents a major challenge in this context. Models either focus on the agent-specific behavior anchored in the current generation of farmers at the expense of representing longer scale environmental processes or they emphasize the simulation of long-term economic and forest developments where representation of human behavior is simplified in time and space. In this context, we compare the representation of individual and aggregated decision-making in the same model structure and by doing so address some implications of choosing short or long term time horizons in land-use modeling. Based on survey data, we integrate dynamic agents into a comparative static economic sector supply model in a Swiss mountain region. The results from an extensive sensitivity analysis show that this agent-based land-use change model can reproduce observed data correctly and that both model versions are sensitive to the same model parameters. In particular, in both models the specification of opportunity costs determines the extent of production activities and land-use changes by restricting the output space. Our results point out that the agent-based model can capture short and medium term developments in land abandonment better than the aggregated version without losing its sensitivity to important socio-economic drivers. For comparative static approaches, extensive sensitivity analysis with respect to opportunity costs, i.e. , the measure of benefits forgone due to alternative uses of labor is essential for the assessment of the impact of climate change on land abandonment and re-forestation in mountain regions.

Suggested Citation

  • Julia Maria Brändle & Gaby Langendijk & Simon Peter & Sibyl Hanna Brunner & Robert Huber, 2015. "Sensitivity Analysis of a Land-Use Change Model with and without Agents to Assess Land Abandonment and Long-Term Re-Forestation in a Swiss Mountain Region," Land, MDPI, vol. 4(2), pages 1-38, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:4:y:2015:i:2:p:475-512:d:50797
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/4/2/475/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/4/2/475/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gellrich, Mario & Baur, Priska & Robinson, Brett Harvey & Bebi, Peter, 2008. "Combining classification tree analyses with interviews to study why sub-alpine grasslands sometimes revert to forest: A case study from the Swiss Alps," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 96(1-3), pages 124-138, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Oliveira, Eduardo & Leuthard, Jasmin & Tobias, Silvia, 2019. "Spatial planning instruments for cropland protection in Western European countries," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    2. James D. A. Millington & John Wainwright, 2016. "Comparative Approaches for Innovation in Agent-Based Modelling of Landscape Change," Land, MDPI, vol. 5(2), pages 1-4, May.
    3. Kopp, Thomas & Salecker, Jan, 2020. "How traders influence their neighbours: Modelling social evolutionary processes and peer effects in agricultural trade networks," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    4. James D. A. Millington & Hang Xiong & Steve Peterson & Jeremy Woods, 2017. "Integrating Modelling Approaches for Understanding Telecoupling: Global Food Trade and Local Land Use," Land, MDPI, vol. 6(3), pages 1-18, August.
    5. Egger, Claudine & Plutzar, Christoph & Mayer, Andreas & Dullinger, Iwona & Dullinger, Stefan & Essl, Franz & Gattringer, Andreas & Bohner, Andreas & Haberl, Helmut & Gaube, Veronika, 2022. "Using the SECLAND model to project future land-use until 2050 under climate and socioeconomic change in the LTSER region Eisenwurzen (Austria)," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    6. Ileana Pătru-Stupariu & Constantina Alina Hossu & Simona Raluca Grădinaru & Andreea Nita & Mihai-Sorin Stupariu & Alina Huzui-Stoiculescu & Athanasios-Alexandru Gavrilidis, 2020. "A Review of Changes in Mountain Land Use and Ecosystem Services: From Theory to Practice," Land, MDPI, vol. 9(9), pages 1-21, September.
    7. Huber, Robert, 2016. "Towards a cost-benefit assessment of farm structural change in European mountain regions," 149th Seminar, October 27-28, 2016, Rennes, France 244785, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    8. Huber, Robert & Zabel, Astrid & Schleiffer, Mirjam & Vroege, Willemijn & Brändle, Julia M. & Finger, Robert, 2021. "Conservation Costs Drive Enrolment in Agglomeration Bonus Scheme," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 186(C).
    9. Utomo, Dhanan Sarwo & Onggo, Bhakti Stephan & Eldridge, Stephen, 2018. "Applications of agent-based modelling and simulation in the agri-food supply chains," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 269(3), pages 794-805.
    10. Huber, Robert & Bakker, Martha & Balmann, Alfons & Berger, Thomas & Bithell, Mike & Brown, Calum & Grêt-Regamey, Adrienne & Xiong, Hang & Le, Quang Bao & Mack, Gabriele & Meyfroidt, Patrick & Millingt, 2018. "Representation of decision-making in European agricultural agent-based models," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 143-160.
    11. Ge Shi & Nan Jiang & Lianqiu Yao, 2018. "Land Use and Cover Change during the Rapid Economic Growth Period from 1990 to 2010: A Case Study of Shanghai," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-15, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Castro, P. & Pedroso, R. & Lautenbach, S. & Vicens, R., 2020. "Farmland abandonment in Rio de Janeiro: Underlying and contributory causes of an announced development," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    2. Biarnès, A. & Bailly, J.S. & Boissieux, Y., 2009. "Identifying indicators of the spatial variation of agricultural practices by a tree partitioning method: The case of weed control practices in a vine growing catchment," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 99(2-3), pages 105-116, February.
    3. Wangya Han & Huiting Lu & Guohua Liu & Jingsheng Wang & Xukun Su, 2019. "Quantifying Degradation Classifications on Alpine Grassland in the Lhasa River Basin, Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(24), pages 1-14, December.
    4. Chiara Calabrese1 & Stefan Mann1 & Michel Dumondel, 2012. "Patterns of occupational choice in the Swiss alpine labor market," Journal of Socio-Economics in Agriculture (Until 2015: Yearbook of Socioeconomics in Agriculture), Swiss Society for Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology, vol. 5(1), pages 31-54.
    5. Feliu López-i-Gelats & Jordi Bartolomé Filella, 2020. "Examining the role of organic production schemes in Mediterranean pastoralism," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 22(6), pages 5771-5792, August.
    6. Renwick, Alan W. & Jansson, Torbjorn & Verburg, Peter H. & Revoredo-Giha, Cesar & Britz, Wolfgang & Gocht, Alexander & McCracken, Davy, 2011. "Policy Reform and Agricultural Land Abandonment," 85th Annual Conference, April 18-20, 2011, Warwick University, Coventry, UK 108772, Agricultural Economics Society.
    7. Müller, Daniel & Leitão, Pedro J. & Sikor, Thomas, 2013. "Comparing the determinants of cropland abandonment in Albania and Romania using boosted regression trees," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 66-77.
    8. Ceddia, M.G. & Heikkil, J. & Peltola, J., 2009. "Managing invasive alien species with professional and hobby farmers: Insights from ecological-economic modelling," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(5), pages 1366-1374, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jlands:v:4:y:2015:i:2:p:475-512:d:50797. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.