Environmental Impact Assessment of Livestock Production Systems
Summary
Environmental impact assessment of livestock production systems seeks to quantify the effects of animal husbandry on climate change, land use, water scarcity, acidification and eutrophication. Central to this endeavour is the life cycle assessment framework, which traces resource inputs and pollutant outputs from feed cultivation, through housing and manure management, to on-farm and off-farm processing. Feed production typically dominates greenhouse gas emissions and water demand, while housing design and manure treatment shape nitrous oxide and ammonia release. Variations in regional practices, animal genetics and diet composition result in substantial heterogeneity in measured impacts. The assessment of multiple environmental indicators enables comparison of production systems—from intensive grain-based operations to extensive grazing or organic enterprises—and guides mitigation strategies such as optimised feed formulation, precision feeding, anaerobic digestion of manure and improved herd genetics. By integrating environmental metrics with economic and social considerations, these assessments inform policy, industry standards and consumer choices on a global scale.
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Environmental Impact Assessment of Livestock Production Systems publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in environmental impact assessment of livestock production systems across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Life cycle assessment (LCA): A standardised method to evaluate environmental burdens associated with all stages of a product’s life, from raw material extraction to disposal.
Functional unit: The quantified reference to which all inputs and outputs in an LCA are normalised, for example 1 kg of live-weight or carcass weight.
Global warming potential (GWP): A measure of how much heat a greenhouse gas traps in the atmosphere over a specified time, expressed as CO₂-equivalents.
Eutrophication potential: An indicator of nutrient enrichment in water bodies leading to algal blooms and oxygen depletion, often expressed in phosphate-equivalents.
Acidification potential: An indicator of acidifying emissions (e.g., sulphur and nitrogen oxides) that contribute to soil and water acidification, expressed in sulphur dioxide-equivalents.
AWARE: A method for assessing water scarcity footprint based on regional water availability and withdrawal impacts, expressed in cubic metres of water scarcity-equivalent.
Feed conversion ratio (FCR): The amount of feed required to produce a unit of animal weight gain, used to evaluate feeding efficiency.
References
- A systematic literature review of Life Cycle Assessments on primary pig production: Impacts, comparisons, and mitigation areas. Sustainable Production and Consumption (2023).
- Environmental life cycle assessment of Finnish broiler chicken production – Focus on climate change and water scarcity impacts. Journal of Cleaner Production (2023).
- Environmental Impacts of Pig and Poultry Production: Insights From a Systematic Review. Frontiers in Veterinary Science (2021).
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