Several research projects have their own web pages.
Norwegian Fish in the European Market: Market Development, Environmental Labeling, and Changing Consumer Preferences (NORFISH)
For successful marketing of Norwegian seafood, the industry needs detailed information about consumer attitudes toward Norwegian farmed and wild fish including attitudes toward future quality assurance schemes. The industry also needs information about the characteristics of various consumer segments, and analyses on how to improve the distribution chains. The principal objectives of the project are to enhance our knowledge about European consumer preferences towards Norwegian fish products and to investigate possible strategies the marine and aquaculture industry can employ to get added value in the European market. The project started on August 1, 2010 and lasts for three years. It is funded by the “Food Program” of the Research Council of Norway and is linked to the project EUROCOD that ended in March 2010. The participants of the project are from Norway, France, Iceland, and the US.
Ecology and Economy of Agriculture in a Changing Climate (EACC) Climate change (CC) will affect a multitude of interlinked processes and components within agroecosystems, including their economics. A complexity of interactions between economic and ecological components within the systems precludes predictions of CC effects, based on the study of single phenomena. In EACC, we will use an established cluster of economic and natural scientific models (ECECMOD) to explore the CC effects on agriculture in Norway. In its existing form, the model cluster can use regionalized global change weather scenarios such as those created by the REGCLIM project to drive the simulation of crop yield functions, farming economy, optimal farming practice, and important environmental variables: nitrate leaching and soil erosion.
Tropical deforestation and land use change This project represents a long term research interest of the principal researcher (Angelsen). Forest conversion to agriculture (deforestation) is studied by the use of agricultural household models, and then linking land users’ decision parameters (prices, technologies, etc.) to broader socio-economic and political factors. Early work included a study from Indonesia (Angelsen 1995) and more general studies on the causes of tropical deforestation (Angelsen 1999). Following a review of “Economic models of deforestation” in 1998, which has become one of the most cited works on deforestation, a comparative project looked at the impact of better agricultural technologies on deforestation. This was published as an edited volume in 2001 (Angelsen and Kaimowitz 2001), and also resulted in some more specific articles (e.g., Angelsen and Kaimowitz 2004). Current work focuses on the forest transition (Rudel et al. 2005), and linking that with the von Thünen model and systematic shifts in agricultural and forest rents, as done in a recent World Bank background paper (Angelsen 2006). Future work will involve comparative studies on how the forest transition is operating in different parts of the tropics.
