Integrating institution into bio-economic modeling for development: A background paper for the IFPRI Biosight project on sustainable agricultural intensification

Policies that are successful in fostering sustainable intensification are critical to current development efforts to alleviate poverty and hunger and foster food security and resilience (The Montpellier Panel, 2013). BioSight is a globally integrated initiative coordinated by IFPRI that aims to contribute to such policies by developing a toolkit that offers high-quality ex ante decision tools, data, and evidence that is based on mathematical bio-economic simulation modeling calibrated to both temporal and spatial (field to globe) scales. It is envisioned that this toolkit would be used for policy analysis that might include ex ante assessment of the tradeoffs associated with policy alternatives in terms of the impacts of economic activity on the environment, impacts of environmental services on economic activity, impacts of environmental regulations on economic activity and well-being, and implications of scaling-up pilots.