Abstract
Abstract Promoting plant diversity through crop mixtures is a mainstay of the agroecological transition. Modelling this transition requires considering both plant–plant interactions and plants’ interactions with abiotic and biotic environments. Modelling crop mixtures enables designing ways to use plant diversity to provide ecosystem services, as long as they include crop management as input. A single modelling approach is not sufficient, however, and complementarities between models may be critical to consider the multiple processes and system components involved at different and relevant spatial and temporal scales. In this article, we present different modelling solutions implemented in a variety of examples to upscale models from local interactions to ecosystem services. We highlight that modelling solutions (i.e. coupling, metamodelling, inverse or hybrid modelling) are built according to modelling objectives (e.g. understand the relative contributions of primary ecological processes to crop mixtures, quantify impacts of the environment and agricultural practices, assess the resulting ecosystem services) rather than to the scales of integration. Many outcomes of multispecies agroecosystems remain to be explored, both experimentally and through the heuristic use of modelling. Combining models to address plant diversity and predict ecosystem services at different scales remains rare but is critical to support the spatial and temporal prediction of the many systems that could be designed.
Highlights
New models are frequently developed for specialists in a field to answer specific scientific questions, without much interaction with other disciplines in the initial stages
This knowledge and model sharing requires certain upstream steps that are t necessary to render models more accessible, such as free licenses, open-source code, accessible ip software products, improved usability, extensive documentation and training sessions. These steps r are especially important when setting up close collaboration between teams of modellers that c include in-depth work on exchanges between models, such as the international modelling s communities working on crop models, such as AgMip (“Agricultural Model Intercomparison and u Improvement Project”; Rosenzweig et al 2013) and MACSUR (“Modelling European Agriculture with n Climate Change”; https://macsur.eu/)
The need exists for accurate predictions of processes and more e global and qualitative modelling approaches to understand an ecosystem, while considering the c feedback between different approaches, especially as the factors involved in ecosystem functioning c are not necessarily the same for the spatial scales considered (Pearson and Dawson 2003; Xu et al, A2021)
Summary
New models are frequently developed for specialists in a field to answer specific scientific questions, without much interaction with other disciplines in the initial stages. We demonstrate that the Acomplementarity between individual-based models (including functional-structural plant models (FSPMs)), crop models and physical or more qualitative or statistical models, improves understanding and facilitates simulating the functioning of crop mixtures and the ecosystem services for which they are designed These modelling complementarities are discussed through the lens of crop mixtures or are integrated at larger scales to address three important modelling challenges: to i) quantify and understand plant-plant interactions and their underlying processes, ii) represent impacts of the environment and agricultural practices on the functioning of crop mixtures and iii) assess the ecosystem services provided by these heterogeneous covers (Figure 1). Upscaling models from local interactions to ecosystem services: realities, Aopportunities and obstacles
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