Journal of Land Use Science

Leveraging agricultural data from the EU’s Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS) for research and policy

All European Union (EU) Member States are obliged to operate an Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS) for the management of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). National IACSs administer farmers’ applications and payments, and allow for verification and monitoring across the EU. IACS provides annually updated, parcel-level data for each holding applying for funding, including agricultural parcel delineation, crop types, agri-environmental interventions, farm size, and animal records. While designed for administrative purposes, publicly available IACS data from the Land Parcel Identification System (LPIS) and Geospatial Application (GSA) components have emerged as a critical resource for scientific research and evidence-based policymaking. Their unparalleled spatial, temporal, and thematic detail makes them a cornerstone for analysing agricultural systems, evaluating policy impacts, and addressing sustainability challenges. However, their full potential to inform and drive a sustainable transformation of EU land management remains underutilized due to challenges such as inconsistent data access across Member States, limited harmonization, and insufficient documentation.

This special issue explores the transformative potential of IACS data for advancing agricultural and environmental research and supporting evidence-based policies. We invite submissions that harness IACS data to investigate questions related to agricultural land use, its changes, and associated environmental and socioeconomic outcomes. The issue will also discuss key challenges in data accessibility, interoperability, and methodological transparency, while showcasing innovative applications of IACS data. While IACS is implemented within the EU, we also welcome contributions from outside the EU that explore similar parcel-level or field-level agricultural data systems, including their applications, and lessons learned.

Topics of interest:

• Assessing the opportunities and limitations of IACS data to provide guidance for data users and advocate for the release of more comprehensive and higher-quality datasets by national administrations.
• Analyzing farmers’ land management decisions, particularly regarding crop diversity and crop rotation patterns at the European scale to evaluate their impacts on biodiversity, soil health, farm livelihoods, and climate resilience.
• Developing farm typologies to classify farms based on their structure, uptake of agri-environmental measures, and socio-economic characteristics to facilitate policy targeting and regulatory interventions.
• Evaluating the effectiveness of current agricultural policies and tailoring future policies to specific farming systems by leveraging IACS data to address regional and farm-level needs, thereby improving policy effectiveness and sustainability outcomes.
• Examining factors influencing the adoption of agri-environmental measures and identifying barriers to their implementation, focusing on promoting practices aligned with EU priorities such as carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, nature restoration, and soil health strategies.
• Integrating IACS data with other datasets, such as for agricultural productivity, farm accountancy, farm surveys, or environmental indicators, or using IACS as reference data for other applications, such as remote sensing of agricultural systems.
• Improving open data and science practices, including harmonization procedures for IACS data across Member States, adhering to open science principles, and fostering collaboration across disciplines.

This focus issue will bring together diverse perspectives and innovative methodologies to provide a roadmap for leveraging IACS data to support sustainable agricultural transitions and inform policy at multiple scales across the EU. It will also serve as a platform for advancing open science and fostering collaboration among researchers, policymakers, and stakeholders.

The guest editors of this focus issue convened as part of the IACS Data Community of Practice, recently established under the Horizon Europe project, Europe-LAND (www.europe-land.eu). The community seeks to connect researchers, policy-makers, and practitioners to foster exchange, share insights, and collaborate on innovative research related to IACS and other agricultural land-use data. Interested experts are welcome to join the community anytime: https://europe-land.eu/iacs-data-community-of-practice/.