Farmer decision making: general

MtM ABM description

Top level farmer decision flowchart

The overall farmer decision making process is shown below. Each farmer goes through this sequence each model time step. Note that the aging and succession step may also result in all of farm land use change, which follows the same general procedure described in Farmer decisions about land use. Click on the red text to find out what happens in each ‘behavioural mode’.

flowchart TB
  A((START))
  B[Age farmers and<br>replace any that exit]
  C[Update income, costs, and<br>profit of holdings and farms]
  E[/For each<br>farmer.../]
  F[Debt-service ratio DSR &larr;<br><span style='font-family:monospace;'>current-debt / current-income</span>]
  G1{DSR &geq;<br>1.00 ?}
  G2{DSR &geq;<br>0.50 ?}
  G3{DSR &geq;<br>0.25 ?}
  H1[<span style='color:red;'>Exit<br>market]
  H2[<span style='color:red;'>Survival<br>mode</span>]
  H3[<span style='color:red;'>Constrained<br>mode</span>]
  H4[<span style='color:red;'>Optimisation<br>mode</span>]
  N[/More<br>farmers?/]
  Z((END))
  A --> B
  B --> C
  C --> E
  E --> F
  F --> G1
  G1 -->|No| G2
  G1 -->|Yes| H1
  G2 -->|No| G3
  G2 -->|Yes| H2
  G3 -->|No| H4
  G3 -->|Yes| H3
  H1 --> N
  H2 --> N
  H3 --> N
  H4 --> N
  N -->|Yes| E
  N -->|No| Z
  click H1 "03b-exit-market-succession.html" "Click for details"

Update History

Date	Changes
2025-10-18	Changing to account for DSR-baed decision loop.
2024-12-19	Initial post.