In order to meet their goals for sustainability, it is necessary for producers, customers, and certification organizations to have tools that can measure and evaluate the performance of their actions. Derric Pennington (Applied Economics) and Len Kne (Director, U-Spatial; MSI PI) and their team, in collaboration with practitioners from Bonsucro, Global Platform for Sustainable Natural Rubber (GPSNR), Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO), PepsiCo, Tetra Pak, and Diageo, are developing a novel geospatial impact forecasting model that translates farm-level actions into predictions of landscape-scale outcomes and impacts. This model, called SCOPE (Sustainable Commodity Optimization and Performance Evaluation), will help commodity producers, certification organizations, and customers plan and evaluate performance against their sustainable commitments and development goals. The tool allows users to focus on specific regions in countries around the world and understand the potential benefits of meeting a variety of performance-based environmental standards or policies. Benefits considered include climate change mitigation and adaptation, reducing water use in water-stressed regions, improving water quality downstream of farms, improving habitat for biodiversity, and improving yields and farmer profitability. A story about this project appears on the website of the College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences: UMN project helps global agriculture supply chains and sustainability schemes improve environmental performance.

This project recently received a UMII Seed Grant. UMII Seed Grant funds are intended to promote, catalyze, accelerate and advance U of M-based informatics research in areas related to the MnDRIVE initiative, so that U of M faculty and staff are well prepared to compete for longer term external funding opportunities. This Seed Grant falls under the Securing the Global Food Supply research area of the MnDRIVE initiative.

Image description: Screenshot of SCOPE user interface.