Frontis : Statistics and modelling in the agro-food production chain

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11 May 2003 19:00 - 14 May 2003
Unit: Wageningen University
Location: Conferentieoord De Wageningse Berg, Gen. Foulkesweg 96, Wageningen
Organisation: Wendelien Ordelman, tel. 0317-495422, email wendelien.ordelman@wur.nl
Website: http://www.wageningen-ur.nl/frontis

 Frontis organizes this workshop together with the Biological Farming Systems Group and the Product Design and Quality Management Group of Wageningen University. Conveners are Ariena van Bruggen, Tiny van Boekel, Alfred Stein and Paul van Beek. Modelling tools are becoming increasingly important to guide the decisions for production of high-quality and safe agricultural foods. To achieve this, a chain approach is necessary and the use of models becomes indispensable. It then becomes possible to control and predict quality attributes, so that product innovation can be done more efficiently. However, quality is an elusive concept, and there is an aspect of subjectivity and uncertainty. This is particularly so for products in the agro-food chain because of biological variation and rather vague consumer wishes. In addition, the perception of food-safety risks may not coincide with real risks, for example those associated with genetically modified organisms, pesticide residues, toxins, or human pathogens. A novel way in the agro-food chain is to tackle subjective elements and uncertainty in modelling by Bayesian statistics and Bayesian Belief Networks. Bayesian approaches use prior probabilities to estimate posterior probabilities with higher accuracy than classical statistical techniques. A first objective is to introduce the subject to participants who are newcomers in this field by presenting an overview of the state of the art. A next objective is to define research areas in the agro-food chain where the Bayesian approach can be usefully applied. The intention is also to establish links between natural and social scientists from Wageningen and similar international institutions. The ultimate goal is to enhance the competitive ability to acquire research funds for development and implementation of decision models for the agro-food chain.
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