Results indicate that it is important to consider not only the environmental-economic tradeoff in farming, but
also the conflict across different environmental criteria in order to determine whether it is reasonable to stimulate
activities which improve some environmental indicators at the expense of getting less desirable values in
others. For instance, an increase of productivity in agriculture enhances soil organic carbon content but it may increase
the risk of contamination with agrochemicals and nutrients. Results are consistent with the notion that extensive
crop-livestock production systems are more balanced than continuous crop farming. According to model
results, optimal land assignment is a combination of crop and livestock activities (62 and 38% of land, respectively)
which is associated with lower agrochemical use, greater organic carbon input to soil, better soil protection
from erosion and more efficient nutrient cycling. This land assignment presents a decrease of 20% in the economic
gross margin compared to the continuous agriculture scheme that maximizes the economic result.
The comparison between current land use and the optimal land assignment based on model results show that
farmers assign a smaller fraction of land to extensive livestock production (2–4%), than in the most balanced
compromise solution (38%). Results also suggest that it would be appropriate to encourage farmers to reduce
the area of land assigned to full-season soybeans.