MODELISATION A BASE D’AGENTS POUR L’EVALUATION ECONOMIQUE DE STRATEGIES DE LUTTE CONTRE LES SCOLYTES A L’ECHELLE DE LA PARCELLE FORESTIERE DANS UN CONTEXTE DE CHANGEMENT CLIMATIQUE
Forests’ ability to deliver a wide range of ecosystem services (timber production, biodiversity, carbon sequestration, recreational uses, etc.) is challenged in the current context of climate change, which involves an increase in intertwined regimes of disturbances, natural or human-related, specifically:
- an increased risk of occurrence and succession of extreme events such as droughts or storms (abiotic risks), which tend to make forest stands more vulnerable;
- increased vulnerability of these stands to attacks by biological pests (biotic risks) such as bark beetles (vulnerability exacerbated by the effects of rising temperatures on the population dynamics of these pests);
- increased risks associated with human factors (anthropogenic risks), with forest managers being encouraged to act to mitigate or contain the adverse impacts of these abiotic and biotic risks (climate change mitigation/adaptation measures, pest control).
This results in a certain complexity in risk management, as these feedbacks between climatic, biological, and human components indeed induce complex spatio-temporal dynamics, difficult to apprehend a priori.
The proposed internship aims, from a decision-support perspective and through an integrative modeling approach (agent-based modeling) relying on various disciplinary contributions (economics, ecology, mathematical modeling, forestry sciences, environmental and climate sciences), to contribute to the development of innovative tools for evaluating strategies to combat bark beetles at the forest plot scale.
The internship is part of the TYPOGRAPHE project (Agent-based modeling for managing bark beetles at the landscape scale), funded by the INRAE XRISQUES meta-program.
Internship Project
Based on materials already collected and/or developed within the project (literature, existing modeling elements), the envisaged work during the internship will consist of:
- conducting a literature review;
- developing a module to assess the economic impact of bark beetles on a forest owner;
- conducting simulation exercises based on different climatic scenarios (drought, temperature increase), different characteristics of the plots (composition of the forest stands), different forest management modalities (thinning regimes, diversification of forest species), and considering different strategies to combat bark beetles (laissez-faire, preventive and curative measures);
- a ranking of these combat strategies based on their economic efficiency.
Research Unit and Supervision
The Bureau of Theoretical and Applied Economics (BETA) is the principal laboratory in Economic and Management Sciences in the Grand-Est region.
The recruited individual will be hosted by BETA at its AgroParisTech campus in Nancy. It is the reference research unit in France on economic issues related to the forest sector. Research on the evaluation of ecosystem services, forest risk management, forest management, and bioeconomic foresight for the forest-wood sector is notably conducted here, often from an interdisciplinary perspective, in strong synergy with environmental science disciplines.
The intern will be integrated into a human-sized team of about 30 people, fostering exchanges.
Geographical and institutional proximity to other laboratories of AgroParisTech and INRAE will also allow a good assimilation of the forest context by the intern.
The recruited person will be supervised by Stéphane Krebs (UMR BETA, INRAE) and will interact with participants involved in the TYPOGRAPHE project: Marielle Brunette and Claire Montagné-Huck (UMR BETA, INRAE), Hervé Jactel (UMR BIOGECO, INRAE, Bordeaux), and Patrick Taillandier (UR MIAT, INRAE, Toulouse). The recruited person may also interact, in a co-construction approach of combat strategies with public and private stakeholders involved in the management of the “bark beetles” risk.
Workplace
Bureau of Theoretical and Applied Economics (BETA), Nancy, AgroParisTech Campus, 14 rue Girardet, 54042 Nancy.
Profile Sought
In terms of education, given the interdisciplinary dimension of the project, the recruitment profile (Master’s level 2 or end of engineering studies) is open: economics, forestry sciences, ecology, applied mathematics/computer science, … motivated to open up to other disciplinary fields.
Duration of the Internship
Six months
Internship Compensation
4.35 euros/hour, approximately 600 euros/month
Start Date of the Internship
March 1, 2025, or April 1, 2025
Application Deadline
Candidates are invited to submit their application (CV + cover letter) before January 17, 2025
Contact:
Stéphane KREBS (stephane.krebs@inrae.fr)