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51days since
Latest PSS update

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DESURVEY

Not yet public

Developers: King's College London (models), AmbioTEK (software)

Associated project(s): DESURVEY Integrated Project

Focus: DESURVEY is a web based policy support system for understanding land degradation and desertification. This PSS is a testbed for the development and implementation of strategies focused on reducing land degradation and desertification including soil erosion, declining productivity and hydrological drought. It also focused on enabling the intended and unintended consequences of development actions on land degradation to be tested in silico before they are tested in vivo . The PSS incorporates detailed spatial datasets at 1-square km and 1 hectare resolution for the entire World, spatial models for biophysical and socioeconomic processes along with scenarios for climate and land use. The PSS calculates a baseline for the current state of biophysical processes relevant to land degradation and allows a series of interventions (policy options) or scenarios of change to be used to understand their impact on land degradation or recovery.

Geographical coverage: global

Spatial resolution: 10 degree tiles @ 1km resolution or 1 degree tiles @ 1-hectare resolution

Temporal resolution: Baseline (1950-2000) and scenario

Development status: 
History: PATTERN model developed 1992, modified for MODULUS 1998, MEDACTION 2001 and then DESURVEY 2003
Version 1: completed

Versions:
Standard version 1
Superuser version 1 (superuser enables latest features but in development so liable to interface bugs)
  

Heavy users: KCL

Documentation: see here