Farm typology identification by multi-variate analysis as a method to scale-up results of integrated impact assessment analysis

Farm typology identification within a specific case study area is a means to summarize the variability among farms in terms of agro-ecological and socio-economic livelihood aspects into farm groupings or ‘typologies’ and thus obtain insight in the major factors which distinguish farming systems. The aim of this paper is to present a methodology to identify farm typologies and indicate how this method could be linked to model-based integrated impact assessment at regional level. The method will be presented as part of the description of a case study in South Uruguay, within the context of the EU project EULACIAS which aims to improve farm livelihoods in an action-research setting using systems approaches.