title: An overview of available crop growth and yield models for studies and assessments in agriculture.
abstract: The scientific community offers numerous crop models with different levels of sophistication. In such a wide range of crop models, users should have the possibility to choose the most suitable, in terms of detail, scale and representativeness, to their objectives. However, even when an appropriate choice is made, model limitations should be clarified such that modelling studies are put in the proper perspective and robust applications are achieved. This work is an overview of available models to simulate crop growth and yield. A summary matrix with more than 70 crop models is provided, storing the main model characteristics that can help users to choose the proper tool according to their purposes. Overall, we found that two main aspects of models, despite their importance, are not always clear from the published references, i.e. the versatility of the models, in terms of reliable transferability to different conditions, and the degree of complexity. Hence, the developers of models should be encouraged to pay more attention to clarifying the model limitations and limits of applicability, and users should make an effort in proper model selection, to save time often devoted to iteration of tuning steps to force an inappropriate model to be adapted to their own purpose.
authors.affiliation: Division on Impacts on Agriculture, Forests and Ecosystem Services, Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change, 01100, Viterbo, Italy.
authors.forename: Arianna
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Di Paola
authors.affiliation: Department for Innovation in Biological, Agro-food and Forest Systems, University of Tuscia, 01100, Viterbo, Italy.
authors.forename: Riccardo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Valentini
authors.affiliation: Division on Impacts on Agriculture, Forests and Ecosystem Services, Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change, 01100, Viterbo, Italy.
authors.forename: Monia
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Santini
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture / Q000379:methods*; D002980:Climate; D057231:Climate Change; D018556:Crops, Agricultural / Q000254:growth & development*; D004777:Environment; D008954:Models, Biological; D012621:Seasons; D012984:Software; D012987:Soil; D014867:Water
chemical_list: D012987:Soil; D014867:Water
keywords: agricultural management; crop growth simulation; crop science; predictive and explanatory models