Simulation of the agroecological production of balanced food baskets: case of Graux Estate. Manu Lambert 1 , Alain Peeters 2 and Elisabeth Simon 3 (1) ULB, Research Unit of Landscape ecology and plant production systems (2) RHEA Research Centre and (3) Graux Estate. Agroecological initiatives are being developed by farmers and farmer’s candidates convinced of the need for a different food system. As a consequence, food self-sufficiency is slowly emerging through the development of social and economic innovations. These farmers often adopt short and local food marketing chain, for instance through food baskets. It is therefore interesting to compose such baskets with healthy and nutritious products. In this framework, the project of the Graux Estate (Tournai, Hainaut Province, Belgium) aims at producing food directly for consumers, in proportions sticking to the population’s needs and through agroecological techniques. Scientific knowledge on human nutrition constantly evolves, as well as the official nutritional recommendations. These standards may be influenced by the lobbying of agrobusiness industries and their reform after new scientific findings is slow and limited, sometimes leading to contradictions between ancient and new concepts. A large range of diets is also proposed and defended. Among these, the ‘paleolithic’ or ‘gather-hunter’ diet stands out for its scientific hypothesis based on evolutionary medicine (Eaton and Konner, 1985; Cordain et al., 2005; Konner and Eaton, 2010). These hypothesis state (1) that human beings, like every species, evolved and adapted according to the environment in which they developed – i.a. their diet – during the 2.5 million years of the Paleolithic era and (2) that our organism is not adapted to cereals and dairy products, food that appeared much more recently in our diet, since 6,000 to 10,000 years. Moreover, recent studies have demonstrated risks associated with consumption of refined sugars and processed foods (Willett and Stampfer, 2003). In this master thesis, we designed an agricultural system that produces balanced food baskets in an agroecological way. With this objective in mind, we first analysed current knowledge in human nutrition and we developed a database on food nutrition for developing these balanced food baskets. They supply all the food necessary for an average person, all year long. Three baskets have been differentiated: (1) one basket adapted from the current consumption patterns of Belgians, (2) one basket based on Houlbert (2008) (inspired from the paleolithic diet), and (3) one basket based on a strict paleolithic diet. The baskets present similar energy and protein levels – respectively 2,100 kcal/day and 15% or more of total energy supply – needed for an average individual. The quantities considered for the different food categories vary a lot with the baskets considered. Among others, the quantity of vegetables, fruits, and oleaginous products is respectively twice and four times as big for the ‘Houlbert-based’ and the Paleolithic diet-based” baskets, compared to the “Belgian’s habits-based” basket. A detailed nutritional analysis was also performed to evaluate and compare the different baskets. It showed fibers, simple sugars and saturated fat levels much more adequate for the “Houlbert-based” and “Paleolithic diet-based” baskets, according to the Belgian official nutrition recommendations. The content of macronutrients of the three baskets is comparable.