Optimal Path for Global Land Use under Climate Change Uncertainty

This study seeks assess how the uncertainties associated with the un- derlying biophysical processes in uence the optimal prole of land use over the next century, in light of potential irreversibility in these deci- sions. Our analysis is based on a dynamic stochastic model of global land use, and employs 3 modeling scenarios constructed using global crop simulation and climate models. The results of the deterministic model show that climate impacts appear to have mixed eects on yields - higher temperatures hurt food production but this eect is partially oset by greater CO2 fertilization eect. Declining food crop yields result in rela- tively small expansion of cropland and accumulated GHG emissions from land use change. We then contrast this optimal path to that obtained when the uncertainty is not ignored, thereby demonstrating signicance of factoring uncertainty in the optimization stage.