As part of an ongoing collaboration on Climate-Smart Agriculture between UC Davis, Wageningen University, the California Department of Food and Agriculture and the California Air Resources Board, this webinar focused on the challenges and opportunities for dairy farming as it relates to a changing climate.

1. Mitigation strategies for livestock in a
global perspective
Meeting on Climate Smart Agriculture
Theun Vellinga, December 1, 2016

2. The complete whole livestock sector GHG emissions
Source: Gerber et al. (2013) Tackling
climate change trhough livestock

3. GHG of the livestock sector
Source: Gerber et al. (2013) T
ackling climate change
trhough livestock

4. DANGER CO2W

5. Rapid industrialization
Low development Slow industrialization
Post-industrial
Human health
Livelihoods
Environment
Food
security
A shared interest with different
priorities
Source: State Of Food
and Agriculture 2009
Ethiopia
India
Brazil Sweden
New Zealand

6. A dichotomy of the livestock sector
Industrial, specialized
§Commodity based
§Optimising animal
§Primary crops,
good land
§Trade-off to environment
§Global sources, markets
§High energy input
§High CO2 profile
Smallholder/backyard
§Multifunctional
§Optimising system
§Crop residues,
marginal land
§Trade-off to animal
§Local sources, markets
§Low energy input
§Low CO2 profile

7. 0.00
2.00
4.00
6.00
8.00
10.00
12.00
0 1 000 2 000 3 000 4 000 5 000 6 000 7 000 8 000 9 000
Output per cow, kg FPCM per year
kgCO2-eq.perkgFPCM
Smallholder systems
Optimizing the farming system
Multifunctional systems
Subsistence farming
No market access
Specialized systems
Optimizing animal performance
Commodity based
Source: Gerber et al., 2011

8. 0.00
2.00
4.00
6.00
8.00
10.00
12.00
0 1 000 2 000 3 000 4 000 5 000 6 000 7 000 8 000 9 000
Output per cow, kg FPCM per year
kgCO2-eq.perkgFPCM
Coupling with food security
Existing technology
Capacity building, technology transfer
Infrastructure and institutions
Market access
New technology
System innovations
Mitigation strategies
Source: Gerber et al., 2011

10. Pigs: little variation in GHG,
wide variation in efficiency
System Backyard Intermediate Industrial
GHG emissions
(kg CO2eq/kg Carcass W.
5.5 6.5 6.0
Feed Conversion
(kg feed/kg LW)
4.9 3.4 2.7
N excretion
(kg N/kg protein output)
2.0 1.0 0.7
N retention
(kg N retained/kg N intake)
0.15 0.23 0.30
Feed source
Food
scraps,
waste
Primary
crops
Primary
crops

11. Mitigation strategies

12. Mitigation in developing countries: 7 * F
§ Food security: a basic right!
● And prerequisite for development
§ Financial, market access, banking infrastructure
§ (Female) Farmers: knowledge transfer
§ Feed improvement: quality and availability
§ Fertilizer use: manure, synthetic fertilizers
§ The Fridge, the cold chain

13. Mitigation in industrialised countries
§ As CO2 is >30 % of the emissions: energy saving along
the complete chain should be considered
§ Nitrogen Use Efficiency
§ Waste and waste utilization!

14. Conclusions
§ Ruminants!
§ Developing countries:
● Combine food security, adaptation and mitigation
● Existing knowledge, market access,
institutional change, infrastructure
§ Industrialised systems:
● CO2 is a large fraction and should get more
attention
§ Develop an approach to affect a diffuse sector
● Simple indicators
● It’s more than technology

15. Thank you
for listening