research-article

Handling practicalities in agricultural policy optimization for water quality improvements

Authors:

Moriah Bostian,

Luba Kurkalova,

Gerald WhittakerAuthors Info & Claims

GECCO '17: Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference

Pages 1065 - 1072

https://doi.org/10.1145/3071178.3071244

Published: 01 July 2017 Publication History

Abstract

Bilevel and multi-objective optimization methods are often useful to spatially target agri-environmental policy throughout a watershed. This type of problem is complex and is comprised of a number of practicalities: (i) a large number of decision variables, (ii) at least two inter-dependent levels of optimization between policy makers and policy followers, and (iii) uncertainty in decision variables and problem parameters. Given agricultural and economic data from the Raccoon watershed in central Iowa, we formulate a bilevel multi-objective optimization problem that accommodates objectives of both policy makers and farmers. The solution procedure then explicitly accounts for the nested nature of farm-level management decisions in response to agri-environmental policy incentives constructed by policy makers. We specifically examine the spatial targeting of a fertilizer-reduction incentive policy while seeking to maximize farm-level productivity while generating mandated water quality improvements using this framework. We test three different evolutionary optimization algorithms - m-BLEAQ, NSGA-II, and SPEA2 - and show that m-BLEAQ is well suited for handling the bilevel optimization problems and the considered practicalities.

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Cited By

Dogan VPrestwich S(2024)Multi-Objective BiLevel Optimization by Bayesian OptimizationAlgorithms10.3390/a1704014617:4(146)Online publication date: 30-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/a17040146
Mejía-De-Dios JRodríguez-Molina AMezura-Montes E(2023)Multiobjective Bilevel Optimization: A Survey of the State-of-the-ArtIEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems10.1109/TSMC.2023.327112553:9(5478-5490)Online publication date: Sep-2023
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSMC.2023.3271125
Ziliaskopoulos KPapalamprou K(2022)A Bilevel Linear Programming Model for Developing a Subsidy Policy to Minimize the Environmental Impact of the Agricultural SectorSustainability10.3390/su1413765114:13(7651)Online publication date: 23-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.3390/su14137651
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Index Terms

Handling practicalities in agricultural policy optimization for water quality improvements
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Symbolic and algebraic manipulation
    1. Symbolic and algebraic algorithms
      1. Optimization algorithms

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cover image ACM Conferences

GECCO '17: Proceedings of the Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference

July 2017

1427 pages

ISBN:9781450349208

DOI:10.1145/3071178

General Chair:
Peter A. N. Bosman
Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI)

Copyright © 2017 ACM.

© 2017 Association for Computing Machinery. ACM acknowledges that this contribution was authored or co-authored by an employee, contractor or affiliate of the United States government. As such, the United States Government retains a nonexclusive, royalty-free right to publish or reproduce this article, or to allow others to do so, for Government purposes only.

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SIGEVO: ACM Special Interest Group on Genetic and Evolutionary Computation

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Published: 01 July 2017

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GECCO '17: Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference

July 15 - 19, 2017

Berlin, Germany

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GECCO '17 Paper Acceptance Rate 178 of 462 submissions, 39%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 1,669 of 4,410 submissions, 38%

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Cited By

Dogan VPrestwich S(2024)Multi-Objective BiLevel Optimization by Bayesian OptimizationAlgorithms10.3390/a1704014617:4(146)Online publication date: 30-Mar-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/a17040146
Mejía-De-Dios JRodríguez-Molina AMezura-Montes E(2023)Multiobjective Bilevel Optimization: A Survey of the State-of-the-ArtIEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics: Systems10.1109/TSMC.2023.327112553:9(5478-5490)Online publication date: Sep-2023
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSMC.2023.3271125
Ziliaskopoulos KPapalamprou K(2022)A Bilevel Linear Programming Model for Developing a Subsidy Policy to Minimize the Environmental Impact of the Agricultural SectorSustainability10.3390/su1413765114:13(7651)Online publication date: 23-Jun-2022
https://doi.org/10.3390/su14137651
Babel MGunathilake MJha M(2021)Evaluation of Ecosystem-Based Adaptation Measures for Sediment Yield in a Tropical Watershed in ThailandWater10.3390/w1319276713:19(2767)Online publication date: 6-Oct-2021
https://doi.org/10.3390/w13192767
Bostian MBarnhart BKurkalova LJha MWhittaker G(2021)Bilevel Optimization of Conservation Practices for Agricultural ProductionJournal of Cleaner Production10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126874(126874)Online publication date: Apr-2021
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126874
Dempe S(2020)Bilevel Optimization: Theory, Algorithms, Applications and a BibliographyBilevel Optimization10.1007/978-3-030-52119-6_20(581-672)Online publication date: 24-Nov-2020
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52119-6_20
Kaim ACord AVolk M(2018)A review of multi-criteria optimization techniques for agricultural land use allocationEnvironmental Modelling & Software10.1016/j.envsoft.2018.03.031105:C(79-93)Online publication date: 1-Jul-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.envsoft.2018.03.031

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