The Agricultural Model Exchange Initiative (AMEI)

The Agricultural Model Exchange Initiative (AMEI) promotes collaboration in agro-environmental research by improving the modularity and interoperability of crop models. Traditional process-based crop simulation models and functional–structural plant models offer complementary insights into crop growth and environmental interactions, but exchanging components between platforms remains challenging. AMEI addresses this by advocating a declarative standard—Crop2ML—to enable framework-independent model parts, enhance code reuse, and support FAIR principles.

Through shared tools, guidelines, and an open repository (CropMRepository), AMEI aims to facilitate model intercomparison, integration of new plant science knowledge, and development of next-generation crop models.