Scenarios for the Austrian food chain in 2020 and its landscape impact s

How the future landscape will look depends particularly on the outcome of the socio-economically motivated decisions of farmers, food processors, retailers and consumers, all members of the food supply chain. However, a long-term perspective on the food supply chain and its landscape effects is confronted with a great deal of uncertainty and data constraints. These difficulties can be partly avoided by using the personal judgements of agents whose decisions control the structure of present and future food supply chains. A well-established agent-based method for dealing with and describing variation in the future is the method of scenario planning. The aim of this paper is to present the application of the scenario approach to the Austrian food supply chain in 2020 and its landscape impacts. A critical discussion of the scenarios should reflect their explanatory power regarding future development options for landscapes. The first section of the paper outlines the interactions between society, the food supply chain and the landscape in a conceptual model. It describes the applied scenario technique and the research setting involving agents from agriculture, the food industry, retailing, gastronomy, and consumer organisations. Four scenarios for the food chain in 2020 are presented (Liberal Market Scenario, Protective Policy Scenario, Fast World Scenario, Slow World Scenario) and their respective consequences and strategies are discussed. The scenario technique used is found to be a useful means of gathering and structuring disperse expert knowledge. The paper concludes that—despite some methodological limitations—scenarios can deal with uncertainty concerning the socio-economic driving forces of landscape change and therefore can be used as a preliminary step in formulating robust strategies for landscape management.