Land allocation decision support system
LADSS or Land Allocation Decision Support System, is an agricultural land use planning tool developed at The Macaulay Institute. More recently the term LADSS is used to refer to the research of the team behind the original planning tool.
Research
The focus of the research of the LADSS team has evolved over time from land use decision support towards policy support, climate change and the concepts of resilience and adaptive capacity.
LADSS Planning Tool
The LADSS planning tool is implemented using the programming language G2 from Gensym alongside a Smallworld GIS application using the Magik programming language and an Oracle database. LADSS models crops using the CropSyst simulation model. LADSS also contains a livestock model plus social, environmental and economic impact assessments.
LADSS has been used to address climate change issues affecting agriculture in Scotland and Italy. Part of this work has involved the use of General Circulation Models (also known as Global climate models) to predict future climate scenarios. Other work has included a study into how Common Agricultural Policy reform will affect the uplands of Scotland, an assessment of agricultural sustainability and rural development research within the AGRIGRID project.
Resources
Peer reviewed papers produced by LADSS are available for download in PDF format.