Description

A 2 ½ - day workshop will be held in Gainesville, Florida during February 23-25, 2015. The workshop will feature keynote speakers and breakout sessions. The keynote speakers will summarize their understanding of the current status of modeling pests and diseases of crops, approaches for using those models with crop and economic models for estimating losses in productivity and impacts on economic conditions. In addition, the keynote speakers will highlight example studies on impacts of climate change on crop production and economics at different scales.

Keynote speakers will be invited and asked by the workshop Program Committee to address specific topics, including

1. Modeling insect populations and their damage to crops at different levels of complexity, focusing on models used in assessments at regional to global scales
2. Modeling plant pathogens and disease outbreaks along with impacts on cropping systems at regional to global scales and different levels of complexity,
3. Modeling cropping systems with capabilities to estimate effects of damage by pests and diseases,
4. Methods for linking models of insect pests and diseases with crop models to predict yield loss
5. Designing and implementing model intercomparisions for crop insect pests and diseases, and
6. Economic model-based assessments of insect and disease impacts on food and economic conditions at different scales.

Breakout working sessions will be held to address key questions, make recommendations to the group and co-sponsors, and to make commitments to AgMIP teams that will continue following this workshop. Initial goals, objectives, and plans will be developed during the workshop for each recommended insect pest and disease intercomparison and improvement team.

A publication subcommittee will be formed by the Program Committee to plan for a special publication of the proceedings of the workshop. It will be formed prior to the workshop itself and will have a tentative publication outlet or outlets (e.g., a special issue of a peer-reviewed journal) that will be discussed in breakout sessions of the workshop.

A final plenary session will be held to summarize key conclusions, recommendations, and plans to workshop attendees and co-sponsors. A major component of the recommendations will be next steps that will be taken, a list of those who make commitments for leading or contributing to the new AgMIP Pest and Disease Teams, and initial timetables for their work. Finally, the recommendations will include suggestions for sources of funding for team activities and projects.