More than 20 researchers and modellers from Poland, Germany, Austria and the UK, are meeting Aberdeenshire farmers and land-owners this week (15 March) to learn about land use in the region.

The field trip, organised by the Macaulay Institute, Aberdeen, forms part of the biannual meeting of participants in the EU funded CAVES (Complexity, Agents, Volatility, Evidence and Scale) research project, designed to bring together the experiences of agricultural land users (such as farmers and estate managers) with advances in computer modelling and complexity theory, in order to better inform policy makers about land use change.

Grampian was chosen as one of three CAVE case study sites for its relative stability in comparison to the other case study areas, as Lee-Ann Small, the Macaulay researcher leading the study in this region, explains: “In the Grampian region, land use has been fairly stable in recent decades, despite the effects of foot and mouth, BSE, and entry into the European Union. Now with the onset of the Single Farm Payment and the number of young people in farming at an all time low, there is concern that this period of relative stability in land use patterns is about to end.

“The purpose of the CAVES Grampian study is to provide policymakers with different scenarios for land use change in the region over the medium term, based on computer-generated models of land use change processes. These models will be based on findings from interviews with agricultural land users, such as farmers and estate managers, as well as other agricultural industry members.”

As part of the data collection phase of the project the Macaulay Institute project team is contacting between 50 and 60 local farmers and estate managers in the Upper Deeside area for interviews, which will focus on local patterns of land use and land use change, response to the Single Farm Payment, and farm succession. This will be followed by computer modelling of findings, and a report back to stakeholders for discussion in 2007.

The Macaulay Institute is the premier land use research institute in the UK. Two hundred and seventy staff are based at the Macaulay Institute at Craigiebuckler in Aberdeen. The Macaulay Institute aims to be an international leader in research on the use of rural land resources for the benefit of people and the environment and is involved in research across the globe; from Scotland to Chile and China. More about the Macaulay Institute can be found at www.macaulay.ac.uk

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The EU-funded CAVES project is part of a larger programme to encourage new methods of studying complex issues, through interdisciplinary research. CAVES focuses on land use change, or lack thereof, in response to external shocks (such as climate or policy change) and internal pressures (such as social constraints). Of specific interest to CAVES research is the role of land users’ social networks in land use change, particularly through shared labour and information, as well as social norms.

The CAVES project has three case studies sites: one in Grampian, Scotland; one in Odra region, Poland; and one in the Vhembe district of Limpopo province, South Africa. The research is being conducted by a partnership of seven research institutions: the Macaulay Land Use Institute, Aberdeen; the Centre for Policy Modelling, Manchester Metropolitan University; Stockholm Environmental Institute, Oxford Office; Wissenschaftliches Zentrum f?r Umweltsystemforschung, Universit?t Kassel, Germany; Politchnika Wroclawska, Poland; the University of Wroclaw, Poland; and the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria.

The CAVES project is funded under the EU 6FP NEST Programme.

Further information on CAVES can be found at: http://caves.cfpm.org

For further information contact:

Karen Sage Tricker PR Office 01224 646491 Mobile 07795 522 012 Email ksage@trickerpr.com