Main authors:	Tamás Kismányoky, Tamás Hermann, Brigitta Tóth, Gergely Tóth, Oihane Fernandez-Ugalde, Minggang Xu, Wang Fei, Thomas Caspari, Zhanguo Bai, Xiaodong Song
Editor:	Jane Brandt
Source document:	Kismányoky, T. et al. (2016) Classification of farming systems across Europe and China. iSQAPER Project Deliverable 2.2 21 pp

A variety of different classifications exist for farming systems in Europe and globally. Some approaches build on the structure of economic enterprises, while others on the physical basis (land, crops, livestock) of production.
»What is a farming system?

Here we review a number of them (SEAMLESS, CATCH-C, Dixon, SMART-SOIL) in order to find if any suit our particular purposes and can be integrated with the concept of pedo-climatic zones. iSQAPER aims to deliver spatially explicit solutions for sustainable land management. Therefore only those farming system classifications which are supported by spatial data with continuous coverage can be realistically included. In addition, the spatial resolution of the data has to be compatible with those of pedoclimatic zones (for example, data of biophysical maps are not compatible with aggregated information of administrative units.)
»Existing classifications of farming systems

The classification of farming systems that iSQAPER developed, and which is used in the Soil Quality App, is based on the traditional approach to classify the physical basis of production and the dominant pattern of farm activities and households, taking account the main technologies used, which determine the intensity of production of crops, livestock and other activities. It relies on available spatial datasets such as CORINE for Europe, GLC30 for China; MapSpam Cropland dataset; Global Distribution of Livestock and includes a crop production system component for possible extension with animal husbandry aspects.
»Farming system classification in the iSQAPER project

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