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Updated: Jul 16, 2026

Watershed Planning within a Quantitative Scenario Analysis Framework
Published on: July 24, 2016
Rural landscape, production and human consumption: past, present and future
Ulf Jansson1, Ulrik Kautsky, Sofia Miliander
1Department of Human Geography, Stockholm University, Sweden. ulf.jansson@humangeo.su.se
Abstract:
Production and consumption of food and in a rural area over the last 400 years were reconstructed for a parish in south east Sweden. This was based on a number of different data sources, including historical maps and official demographic and agricultural statistics. Changes in population (and thus consumption) and the production from arable land and livestock were calculated and used to provide an estimate of the area's supply and demand over time, and of the historical sustainability of the area. Overall food productivity was remarkably constant over time, at approximately 0.04 kgC m(-2) y(-1), despite recent changes in population size and the area of cultivated land. The empirical results from the past and the present, together with the future land changes due to shoreline displacement were used to predict the situation in the future. These final estimates can be used in the assessment of risk for exposure to contaminated food for the future population in the area.
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