A land evaluation decision support system (MicroLEIS DSS) for agricultural soil protection With special reference to the Mediterranean region

Soil protection requires the improvement of agricultural land use, its planning and its management, in order to achieve a sustainable development. Land evaluation analysis is considered an interface between land resources survey and land use planning and management. The application of information and communication technology has exerted an impact on sustainable land use decision support. Since the early 1990s and following this trend, MicroLEIS (Mediterranean Land Evaluation Information System) has evolved towards an agro-ecological decision support system. The original project corresponds to a set of qualitative land evaluation methods converted to PC computer programs to automate their application. Today, MicroLEIS DSS is a set of useful tools for decision-making which in a wide range of agro-ecological schemes. The design philosophy follows a toolkit approach, integrating many software tools: databases, statistics, expert systems, neural networks, Web and GIS applications, and other information technologies. The MicroLEIS DSS system, in English and Spanish simultaneously, is available ready-for-use from the following website address: www.microleis.com. The new, re-designed MicroLEIS DSS will provide considerable opportunities for greater cooperation in interdisciplinary research and in the application of knowledge to solve problems of soil protection.