Re-framing the climate change debate in the livestock sector: mitigation and adaptation options
Abstract
Livestock play a key role in the climate change debate. As with crop‐based agriculture, the sector is both a net greenhouse gas emitter and vulnerable to climate change. At the same time, it is an essential food source for millions of people worldwide, with other functions apart from food security such as savings and insurance. By comparison with crop‐based agriculture, the interactions of livestock and climate change have been much less studied. The debate around livestock is confusing due to the coexistence of multiple livestock farming systems with differing functions for humans, greenhouse gas (GHG) emission profiles and different characteristics and boundary issues in their measurement, which are often pooled together. Consequently, the diversity of livestock farming systems and their functions to human systems are poorly represented and the role of the livestock sector in the climate change debate has not been adequately addressed. In this article, building upon the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fifth Assessment Report (IPCC 5AR) findings, we review recent literature on livestock and climate change so as better to include this diversity in the adaptation and mitigation debate around livestock systems. For comparative purposes we use the same categories of managerial, technical, behavioral and policy‐related action to organize both mitigation and adaptation options. We conclude that different livestock systems provide different functions to different human sy…
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Expanding the use of diversified farming methods for animal production can lead to improved environmental outcomes and beneficial ecosystem services in addition to food production.
“Expanding the use of diversified farming methods for animal production (including integrated crop-livestock systems, carefully managed grazing, and MSPRs) can lead to improved environmental outcomes and beneficial ecosystem services (e.g., wildlife and pollinator habitat, improved nutrient cycling) in addition to food production (Russelle et al., 2007;Kremen et al., 2012;Rivera-Ferre et al., 2016;”
From Ecosystem Impacts and Productive Capacity of a Multi-Species Pastured Livestock System (2020) · cites this paper as Rivera-Ferre et al., 2016
Cites
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“Some studies show that these mechanisms can promote GHG mitigation and improve the livelihood of service providers, via the provision of institutional frameworks for management and regulation and through incentives for behavioral change.(95,96) Critics question the appropriateness of these mechanisms for GHG mitigatio…”
BackgroundLivestock-related greenhouse gas emissions: impacts and options for policy makers
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Ecosystem Impacts and Productive Capacity of a Multi-Species Pastured Livestock System
Rowntree, J. E., Stanley, P. L., Maciel, I. C. F., Thorbecke, M., Rosenzweig, S. T., Hancock, D. W., Guzman, A., & Raven, M. R. (2020) · Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems · doi:10.3389/fsufs.2020.544984 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
“, wildlife and pollinator habitat, improved nutrient cycling) in addition to food production (Russelle et al., 2007; Kremen et al., 2012; Rivera-Ferre et al., 2016; Kremen and Merenlender, 2018; Kumar et al., 2019).”
Background
- Authors
- Rivera‐Ferre, M. G., López‐i‐Gelats, F., Howden, M., Smith, P., Morton, J. F., & Herrero, M.
- Affiliations
- Universitat de Vic - Universitat Central de Catalunya (ES)
- Corresponding author
- Rivera‐Ferre, M.G.
- Venue
- WIREs Climate Change
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2016-07-25
- Volume
- 7
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 869-892
- ISSN
- 1757-7780 (ISSN-L)
- 1757-7799
- OpenAlex
- W2490960482
- Cited by
- 157
- References
- 7
- Citations by year
- 2026: 7 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 19 · 2023: 18 · 2022: 20 · 2021: 51 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 6
- FWCI
- 5.81
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change (publishedVersion)
- Greenwich Academic Literature Archive (University of Greenwich) (acceptedVersion)
- ANU Open Research (Australian National University) (submittedVersion)
- DIGITAL.CSIC (Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Natural Environment Research Council (NE/M021327/1)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Agriculture Sustainability and Environmental Impact
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Climate change impacts on agriculture
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics › Agriculture and Rural Development Research
- Keywords
- livestock, climate change mitigation, climate change adaptation, greenhouse gas emissions, livestock production systems, food security, IPCC Fifth Assessment Report, win-win strategy
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