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Agro-Ecological Zone Simulation Model Development
azsimulator.org

Financing Institution: World Bank
Program: ‘Regional Agro-Climatic Study To Assess Climate Change Impacts On Land Use’
The Agro zones Simulator project was made possible by the generous contribution of the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Finance, through the Spanish Fund for Latin America and the Caribbean (SFLAC)
worldbank.org/sflac
Consultancy assignment representing the first input, namely the Agro-ecological Zone Model, into the regional World Bank study for Latin America entitled “Regional Agro-climatic Study to Assess Climate Change Impacts on Land Use”.

Partnership
Consorzio Milano Ricerche
JRC Joint Research Centre

The objective of the study is to enhance regional knowledge and capacity for understanding, simulating, and assessing the impact of climate change on agro-ecological zones and component land uses, via an Agro-Zone Simulation (AZS) model with outputs coupled to the World Bank's Environmental Impacts and Sustainability Applied General Equilibrium model (ENVISAGE) to guide adaptation responses, mitigation implications, and related policy options.
Study main outcomes:
>  Formulation of a user-friendly and accessible AZS-type model, that provides a platform for data and model sharing among all interested member countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, a sound tool for analysis of impacts and adaptation responses.
>  Data interpretation of results in representative agro-ecological zones to provide disaggregated knowledge of the overall impact of climate change on the agriculture sector and potential adaptation options.

The output is an user-friendly agro-meteorological zone model platform, capable of collecting necessary agro-climatology datasets and providing equations for data manipulation by the user, including generic crop suitability and water balance calculations and mapping. The modeling platform will facilitate the evaluation of changes in cropping patterns and growing seasons as a function of projected changes in temperature, precipitation and evaporative demands, including investigations of adaptation potentials by means of available or improved varieties will also be investigated.
Two types of applications were needed:
> Web-based viewer application
> Rich client (will run on local hardware, but will require connection)

The Agro-ecological Zones Simulator is a realization based on the BioMA (Biophysical Model Applications) platform. BioMA is an extensible platform for running biophysical models on generic spatial units: and it is based on discrete conceptual units codified in software components (both for simulation engines and user’s interface).