Bioeconomic Model of Decision Support System for Farm Management: Proposal of a Mathematical Model

Abstract

The declining profitability of agriculture and livestock production, increasing climatic variations, and growing concern over the environmental impact of farming challenge farm management. In this context, we propose a generalized mathematical bioeconomic macro model for livestock production systems. This model resulted from a multidisciplinary effort to integrate major databases of climate, soil, plants, animals, and their economic aspects, searching for representing a livestock production similar to Brazilian systems of pasture-based beef cattle production. This work is divided into four submodels: (i) herd structure and animal characteristics; (ii) animal nutrient requirements; (iii) meteorological–soil–pasture–animal integration; and (iv) economic. We adopted the system dynamics modelling methodology, composed of differential and integral equations in structured iThink 9.1.4 software. The equations herein proposed were adapted from pre-existing studies, and we intend to include them into a macro model in the future and use them to build different scenarios based on real data. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.