Fig. 4

Now using the parameters from the chronic case, we simulate the multi-village model over 30 seasons. By systematically varying the parameter k by increments of 0.1, three qualitatively different scenarios are observed and representative cases are presented in the table above. When k is too small, the initial village where the famine occurs suffers a loss of \(30\%\) of its population over the course of about 10 seasons. For values of k between 0.2 and 0.7 inclusive, famine is precluded successfully without any loss of human life. Should the k value be too large, we observe the famine spread catastrophically in space in time. By the end of 30 seasons, all villages except the last three suffer at least a \(99\%\) decrease in population