Abstract: • First model inter-comparison on crop rotations. • Continuous simulation of multi-year crop rotations yields outperformed single-year simulation. • Low accuracy of yield predictions in less commonly modelled crops such as potato, radish, grass vegetation. • Multi-model mean prediction was found to minimise the likely error arising from single-model predictions. • The representation of intermediate crops and carry-over effects in the models require further research efforts.
Diversification of crop rotations is considered an option to increase the resilience of European crop production under climate change. So far, however, many crop simulation studies have focused on predicting single crops in separate one-year simulations. Here, we compared the capability of fifteen crop growth simulation models to predict yields in crop rotations at five sites across Europe under minimal calibration. Crop rotations encompassed 301 seasons of ten crop types common to European agriculture and a diverse set of treatments (irrigation, fertilisation, CO2 concentration, soil types, tillage, residues, intermediate or catch crops). We found that the continuous simulation of multi-year crop rotations yielded results of slightly higher quality compared to the simulation of single years and single crops. Intermediate crops (oilseed radish and grass vegetation) were simulated less accurately than main crops (cereals). The majority of models performed better for the treatments of increased CO2 and nitrogen fertilisation than for irrigation and soil-related treatments. The yield simulation of the multi-model ensemble reduced the error compared to single-model simulations. The low degree of superiority of continuous simulations over single year simulation was caused by (a) insufficiently parameterised crops, which affect the performance of the following crop, and (b) the lack of growth-limiting water and/or nitrogen in the crop rotations under investigation. In order to achieve a sound representation of crop rotations, further research is required to synthesise existing knowledge of the physiology of intermediate crops and of carry-over effects from the preceding to the following crop, and to implement/improve the modelling of processes that condition these effects.

Abstract: • Systematic analysis of the influence of spatial soil data resolution on simulated regional yields and total growing season evapotranspiration. • The responses of four crop models of different complexity are compared. • Differences between models are larger than the effect of the chosen spatial soil data resolution. • Low influence of soil data resolution due to: high precipitation amount, methods for calculating water retention and method of data aggregation. The spatial variability of soil properties is an important driver of yield variability at both field and regional scale. Thus, when using crop growth simulation models, the choice of spatial resolution of soil input data might be key in order to accurately reproduce observed yield variability. In this study we used four crop models (SIMPLACE<LINTUL-SLIM>, DSSAT-CSM, EPIC and DAISY) differing in the detail of modeling above-ground biomass and yield as well as of modeling soil water dynamics, water uptake and drought effects on plants to simulate winter wheat in two (agro-climatologically and geo-morphologically) contrasting regions of the federal state of North-Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) for the period from 1995 to 2008. Three spatial resolutions of soil input data were taken into consideration, corresponding to the following map scales: 1:50 000, 1:300 000 and 1:1 000 000. The four crop models were run for water-limited production conditions and model results were evaluated in the form of frequency distributions, depicted by bean-plots. In both regions, soil data aggregation had very small influence on the shape and range of frequency distributions of simulated yield and simulated total growing season evapotranspiration for all models. Further analysis revealed that the small influence of spatial resolution of soil input data might be related to: (a) the high precipitation amount in the region which partly masked differences in soil characteristics for water holding capacity, (b) the loss of variability in hydraulic soil properties due to the methods applied to calculate water retention properties of the used soil profiles, and (c) the method of soil data aggregation. No characteristic “fingerprint” between sites, years and resolutions could be found for any of the models. Our results support earlier recommendation to evaluate model results on the basis of frequency distributions since these offer quick and better insight into the distribution of simulation results as compared to summary statistics only. Finally, our results support conclusions from other studies about the usefulness of considering a multi-model approach to quantify the uncertainty in simulated yields introduced by the crop growth simulation approach when exploring the effects of scaling for regional yield impact assessments.

Abstract: Problems related to food security and sustainable development are complex (Ericksenet al., 2009) and require consideration of biophysical, economic, political, and social factors, as well as their interactions, at the level of farms, regions, nations, and globally. While the solution to such societal problems may be largely political, there is a growing recognition of the need for science to provide sound information to decision-makers (Meinke et al., 2009). Achieving this, particularly in light of largely uncertain future climate and socio-economic changes, will necessitate integrated assessment approaches and appropriate integrated assessment modeling (IAM) tools to perform them. Recent (Ewertet al., 2009; van Ittersumet al., 2008) and ongoing (Rosenzweiget al., 2013) studies have tried to advance the integrated use of biophysical and economic models to represent better the complex interactions in agricultural systems that largely determine food supply and sustainable resource use. Nonetheless, the challenges for model integration across disciplines are substantial and range from methodological and technical details to an often still-weak conceptual basis on which to ground model integration (Ewertet al., 2009; Janssenet al., 2011). New generations of integrated assessment models based on well-understood, general relationships that are applicable to different agricultural systems across the world are still to be developed. Initial efforts are underway towards this advancement (Nelsonet al., 2014; Rosenzweiget al., 2013). Together with economic and climate models, crop models constitute an essential model group in IAM for large-area cropping systems climate change impact assessments. However, in addition to challenges associated with model integration, inadequate representation of many crops and crop management systems, as well as a lack of data for model initialization and calibration, limit the integration of crop models with climate and economic models (Ewertet al., 2014). A particular obstacle is the mismatch between the temporal and spatial scale of input/output variables required and delivered by the various models in the IAM model chain. Crop models are typically developed, tested, and calibrated for field-scale application (Booteet al., 2013; see also Part 1, Chapter 4 in this volume) and short time-series limited to one or few seasons. Although crop models are increasingly used for larger areas and longer time-periods (Bondeauet al., 2007; Deryng et al., 2011; Elliottet al., 2014) rigorous evaluation of such applications is pending. Among the different sources of uncertainty related to climate and soil data, model parameters, and structure, the uncertainty from methods used to scale-up crop models has received little attention, though recent evaluations indicate that upscaling of crop models for climate change impact assessment and the resulting errors and uncertainties deserve attention in order to advance crop modeling for climate change assessment (Ewertet al., 2014; R¨ otteret al., 2011). This reality is now reflected in the scientific agendas of new international research projects and programs such as the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP; Rosenzweiget al., 2013) and MACSUR (MACSUR, 2014). In this chapter, progress in evaluation of scaling methods with their related uncertainties is reviewed. Specific emphasis is on examining the results of systematic studies recently established in AgMIP and MACSUR. Main features of the respective simulation studies are presented together with preliminary results. Insights from these studies are summarized and conclusions for further work are drawn. No Label