• Where are potential production locations for a specific crop (such as coffee, quinoa or hazelnuts) on a local, regional or global scale?
• What are the major limitations of new production intentions?
• How does climate change impact future crop suitability?
• What high value crops are suitable for agricultural diversification in a specific location?

• Suitability modelling of any crop in any region of interest
• Screening of suitable crops for agricultural diversification in a specific location
• Data mining activities (crop, biophysical and socio-economic requirements) and integration into our existing databases for comprehensive feasibility studies
• Spatial analysis of data (e.g. soil, climate) provided to us by a partner institution
• Collaborations in transdisciplinary research projects dealing with land evaluation and the socio-cultural aspects related to it

• Suitability of soybean production in Kenya(PDF 3,3 MB)
• Potential for crop diversification in Gulang County (Gansu, China)(PDF 2,5 MB)

Explore the global suitability of five plantation crops (avocado, cashew, cocoa, coffee, mango) modelled with CONSUS visiting the CONSUS Webtool.

CONSUS (CONnecting for SUstainable Sourcing) is a tool based on Geographic Information Systems (GIS) used for spatially-explicit multi-criteria analysis. The tool allows us to compares crop requirements with biophysical and socio-economic criteria of the production locations (matching). In CONSUS, biophysical information include current and future climate, soil and landscape characteristics, while socio-economic information may include infrastructure, farm characteristics or economic indicators. The results show the overall suitability, including associated limiting factors and potential effects on future suitability caused by climatic change.

CONSUS is a flexible tool that can be used for any crop or variety on different scales, by applying appropriate crop specific criteria and parameters. In addition to their general suitability, agricultural projects can be assessed for their social and economic sustainability.

The CONSUS model structure including two case studies is described in detail in our recent publication:

Jaisli, I., Laube, P., Trachsel, S., Ochsner, P., & Schuhmacher, S. (2019). Suitability evaluation system for the production and sourcing of agricultural commodities. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, 161, 170–184. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2018.02.002

The project is funded by the Syngenta Foundation of Sustainable Agriculture (SFSA), which also acts as a consulting partner and contributes ongoing case studies to the project.