Sustainable agriculture, the Institute of Economics participates in the DS-CHANGES project to assess key factors for the adoption of carbon farming practices in Lombardy
University of Brescia, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa and Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM) together to assess the benefits of carbon farming practices in the fight against climate change. Thanks to funding from the Fondazione Cariplo, within the 'Data Science for Climate and Agriculture' call for proposals, the DS-CHANGES project aims to design policies to promote carbon farming in agriculture in Lombardy.
The potential benefits of carbon farming
DS-CHANGES explores the untapped potential of agricultural soils to store large amounts of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, and utilise it in the form of organic matter for the benefit of soil fertility. In addition to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, carbon farming can bring additional benefits in terms of agricultural sustainability, such as increased biodiversity, reduced water pollution, improved efficiency in the use of natural resources and, consequently, increased profitability for farmers who decide to experiment with this system, which is already widespread in the United States, Canada and Australia.
The role of the consortium in DS-CHANGES
The research team at the Institute of Economics of the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa is responsible for activities aimed at developing a high-resolution dataset using various data sources at farm level. The dataset can be used to identify the key factors that lead to the adoption of carbon farming techniques and to assess the minimum price to be assigned to 'carbon credits' (i.e. subsidies based on the CO2 sequestration activity done by the farm) in order to make them economically advantageous.
This data will form the basis for building and informing an agent model developed by the research team of the Department of Economics and Management of the University of Brescia. The model will make medium-term forecasts on the adoption of carbon farming practices (the first case study will be Lombardy's agriculture) by integrating biophysical, socioeconomic and ecosystem modelling approaches to simulate both natural and social compartments. The model will then produce mid-century projections of alternative climate and policy scenarios to assess the impact of carbon farming.
Finally, the Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM) team will be responsible for the effective dissemination of the project results to the academic and policy communities, as well as to industrial stakeholders and civil society.
