Opportunities for systems scientists in modeling agricultural systems

The use of projections in public and private decisions is reviewed with emphasis on agricultural decisions. At the public level the decisions deal with agricultural policy, program and project problems and at the private level with the problems encountered by farm and agribusiness firm managers. There is a discussion of (1) the impact of increased competence in economics and econometrics on the use of specialized projections with respect to agriculture and (2) the credibility gap which has arisen among decision-makers with respect to all quantitative work. The reasons for this credibility gap reveal opportunities for systems scientists in modeling the domains of agrarian problems and further developing systems-science techniques to (1) include "man components" and (2) close the normative feedback loops required in iteratively and interactively defining and solving problems.