The Regional Multi-Agent Simulator (RegMAS): assessing the impact of the "Health Check" in an Italian region

Agent-based models (AMB) allow to conceive social systems as the result of individually-acting agents. When they are applied to agriculture, they can simulate the fundamental behaviour at the micro-level of the individual farmers, without the need of aggregating them in “representative” agents. RegMAS (Regional Multi Agent Simulator) is an open-source spatially explicit multi-agent model framework specifically designed for long-term simulations of effects of policies on agricultural systems. Using iterated conventional optimisation problems as agents' behavioural rules, it allows for a bidirectional integration between geophysical and social models where spatially distributed characteristics are taken into account in the linear programming problem of the optimising agents as individual resources. The model is applied to asses the impact of the Health Check, the imminent further Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reform, on farms structures, incomes and land use in a hilly area of a central Italian region (Marche). Our results suggest that the Health Check, while increasing the farmer profit net of CAP support, is substantially neutral on the overall farmer incomes, also through a reduction of the off-farm labour. Neverless, a limited negative effects may arise in the farms numerousness, with the consequence of a land abandonment that is noticeable only on mountain areas, where distances between farmers are greater.Agent based model, health check, regional economics, Agricultural and Food Policy, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

The regional model for Mediterranean agriculture

AgriPoliS is a multi-agent mixed integer linear programming (MIP) model, spatially explicit, developed in C++ language and suitable for long-term sim- ulations of agricultural policies. Beyond the mixed integer programming core, the model main feature is the interaction among a set of heterogeneous farm- ers and between them and the environment in which they operate. In this paper we describe an extension of the model allowing AgriPoliS to deal with typical characters of the Mediterranean agriculture. In particular AgriPoliS was extended to allow a generic number of products and soil types, included perennial crops and products with quality differentiation. Furthermore, it can explicitly take into account irrigation.Mediterranean Agriculture; Common Agricultural Policy; Agent-based Models

Modelling the Impact of 2003 CAP Reform on Crop Production: The case of Durum Wheat in Italy

This paper aims to summarize some of the major results emerging from simulating the impact of the CAP reform (the so-called Fischler Reform or Luxembourg Agreement, LA) within the AG-MEMOD model of the agri-food sector in Italy. The paper shows how the model generates impacts when alternative policy scenarios (Agenda 2000 vs. LA) are specified. As major evidence of this impact in the Italian case, the crop sector is dealt with in detail. In particular, the case of supplementary payments for durum wheat clarifies how the reform may specifically affect Mediterranean agriculture and how alternative specifications of the regime switch in durum wheat support relevantly influence the impact.Common Agricultural Policy, Italian Agriculture, Commodity Market Models, Crop Production/Industries, Q110, Q180,

The Regional Multi-Agent Simulator (RegMAS): an open-source spatially explicit model to assess the impact of agricultural policies

RegMAS (Regional Multi Agent Simulator) is an open-source spatially explicit multi-agent model framework specifically designed for long-term simulations of the effects of policies on agricultural systems. Using iterated conventional optimisation problems as agents’ behavioural rules, it allows for a bidirectional integration between geophysical and social models where spatially-distributed characteristics are taken into account in the programming problem of the optimising agents. With RegMAS it is possible to simulate the local specific response to a given policy (or scenario), where policies, together with macro and regional characteristics, are read into the program in specially formatted spreadsheets and standard GIS files. The paper presents the model logic and structure and describes its functioning by applying it to a case-study, where RegMAS results are compared with conventional agent-based modelling to demonstrate the advantages of spatial explicitness. The simulation refers to the impact of the recent “Health Check” of the CAP on farm structures, income and land use in a hilly area of a central Italian region (Marche).Agent-Based Modelling; Mathematical Programming; Explicit Spatial Analysis; Common Agricultural Policy

The Regional Multi-Agent Simulator (RegMAS): an open-source spatially explicit model to assess the impact of agricultural policies

RegMAS (Regional Multi Agent Simulator) is an open-source spatially explicit multi-agent model framework specifically designed for long-term simulations of the effects of policies on agricultural systems. Using iterated conventional optimisation problems as agents’ behavioural rules, it allows for a bidirectional integration between geophysical and social models where spatially-distributed characteristics are taken into account in the programming problem of the optimising agents. With RegMAS it is possible to simulate the local specific response to a given policy (or scenario), where policies, together with macro and regional characteristics, are read into the program in specially formatted spreadsheets and standard GIS files. The paper presents the model logic and structure and describes its functioning by applying it to a case-study, where RegMAS results are compared with conventional agent-based modelling to demonstrate the advantages of spatial explicitness. The simulation refers to the impact of the recent “Health Check” of the CAP on farm structures, income and land use in a hilly area of a central Italian region (Marche)

The Regional Multi-Agent Simulator (RegMAS): an open-source spatially explicit model to assess the impact of agricultural policies

RegMAS (Regional Multi Agent Simulator) is an open-source spatially explicit multi-agent model framework specifically designed for long-term simulations of the effects of policies on agricultural systems. Using iterated conventional optimisation problems as agents’ behavioural rules, it allows for a bidirectional integration between geophysical and social models where spatially-distributed characteristics are taken into account in the programming problem of the optimising agents. With RegMAS it is possible to simulate the local specific response to a given policy (or scenario), where policies, together with macro and regional characteristics, are read into the program in specially formatted spreadsheets and standard GIS files. The paper presents the model logic and structure and describes its functioning by applying it to a case-study, where RegMAS results are compared with conventional agent-based modelling to demonstrate the advantages of spatial explicitness. The simulation refers to the impact of the recent “Health Check” of the CAP on farm structures, income and land use in a hilly area of a central Italian region (Marche)

The regional model for Mediterranean agriculture

AgriPoliS is a multi-agent mixed integer linear programming (MIP) model, spatially explicit, developed in C++ language and suitable for long-term sim- ulations of agricultural policies. Beyond the mixed integer programming core, the model main feature is the interaction among a set of heterogeneous farm- ers and between them and the environment in which they operate. In this paper we describe an extension of the model allowing AgriPoliS to deal with typical characters of the Mediterranean agriculture. In particular AgriPoliS was extended to allow a generic number of products and soil types, included perennial crops and products with quality differentiation. Furthermore, it can explicitly take into account irrigation

The regional model for Mediterranean agriculture

AgriPoliS is a multi-agent mixed integer linear programming (MIP) model, spatially explicit, developed in C++ language and suitable for long-term sim- ulations of agricultural policies. Beyond the mixed integer programming core, the model main feature is the interaction among a set of heterogeneous farm- ers and between them and the environment in which they operate. In this paper we describe an extension of the model allowing AgriPoliS to deal with typical characters of the Mediterranean agriculture. In particular AgriPoliS was extended to allow a generic number of products and soil types, included perennial crops and products with quality differentiation. Furthermore, it can explicitly take into account irrigation

Analysis of the impact of decoupling on two Mediterranean regions

AgriPoliS is a multi-agent mixed integer linear programming (MIP) model, spatially explicit, developed in C++ language and suitable for long-term simulations of agricultural policies. Once extended to deal with typical characters of the Mediterranean agriculture, AgriPoliS is used in this paper to describe the implementation of alternative policy cenarios and to apply them to two regions located in Central and South Italy. Results suggest that the effects of decoupling policies in the Mediterranean agriculture, as implemented in the 2003 reform, are often dominated by effects of structural trends and only a "bond scheme" would substantially change the regional farm structures. In no scenario we observe remarkable agricultural land abandonment