D1.8 – Update and testing of the decision support tool (DSS)

Several studies agree on the existence of a considerable amount of land in Europe deemed less favourable for conventional agriculture. This land has been either abandoned because of its productivity, or it is used as grassland. MAGIC is based on the premise that cultivation of selected industrial crops on areas facing natural constraints (e.g. extreme climatic conditions, low soil productivity, steep slope, etc.) can i) ensure the production of resource-efficient feedstocks, with low indirect land-use change (iLUC), for a growing bio-based industry, and ii) increase farmers’ incomes through access to new markets and the revalorization of marginal land.
MAGIC Deliverable D1.8 – A second prototype of the decision support tool (DSS) aims to provide the underlying information as required above and generated within the MAGIC project to the various interested stakeholders across Europe. What is new in this second version as compared to the former version is the spatial detail at which the marginal land data are displayed and the inclusion of Ukraine. The marginal land area can now be consulted at the LAU I and II level which is municipal level in most countries, and this is a much more spatially detailed level than the Nuts 2/3 level used in the former prototype versions.
This second prototype will be improved upon in the final version at the end of the project. All three current information platforms (MAGIC-Maps, MAGIC-Crops and the DSS are currently available in a prototype version at http://magic-h2020.eu/.