Sustainable Beef Systems – Cows and Carbon Factsheet

There is significant risk to the sustainability and profitability of farm businesses if the impacts of climate change are not tackled. Scotland has already experienced extreme weather events including record-breaking temperatures and drought with significant water scarcity in 2023. It is anticipated that by 2050 extreme weather events in Scotland will be more common, and warmer wetter winters and warmer drier summers will become the norm.

Research from WWF Scotland has revealed that increased extreme weather events in Scotland could reduce the profitability of an average beef farm by up to 12%, through reduced grass yield and grazing period, resulting in an increase in purchased feed and bedding requirements and reduced livestock productivity.

Changes in Scotland’s climate will continue to intensify, however the extent to which these changes happen depends on our ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Here we give an overview of the potential impacts of climate change on beef farms, and the mitigations and adaptations you can adopt to help with these.

Impacts of Climate Change

The following table highlights some of the possible impacts of climate change.

Climate Change Impact	Agricultural Impacts
Warmer Wetter Winters	Reduce the grazing capabilities of more marginal ground. Extended housing period – cattle housed earlier and turned out later. Reduced frost, reducing capability to work on land during the winter months. Increased fluke risk and other health issues.
Warmer drier summers	Increased risk of water scarcity for livestock. Increased threat from diseases and viruses not common in Scotland.
Extreme Weather - Drought	Reduced grazing and grass yields. Increased water and heat stress of livestock. Increased water contamination risks where drinking water levels reduce significantly.
Extreme Rainfall Events	Reduced grazing potential, increased risk of soil run off and compaction. Increased flood risk.

 

Understanding Agricultural Emissions

Agriculture contributes to climate change through the production of food from land. The main emissions from agriculture are methane and nitrous oxide, both potent greenhouse gases (GHGs).

Around 12% of global emissions in 2021 were attributed to agriculture, the second highest emitting sector according to the World Resource Institute, behind energy at 75% and ahead of industrial processes at 6.6%. The food system, including agriculture, land use change and the wider supply chain (processing, packaging, transport etc.) accounts for about 25% of global emissions. If end use (cooking and waste) is included the figure can rise to 35% of global emissions. Livestock and manure account for 50% of the emissions from agriculture, therefore this equals a total of 6% of global emissions.

In the UK, emissions from Agriculture accounted for 12% of national emissions in 2023, while in Scotland it was 19% in 2022.

Therefore, it is in the interest of farmers and the wider industry to work towards reducing emissions on farm while building resilience to climate change.

Understanding Emissions from Cattle

Emissions from cattle occur predominantly from methane production in the animal through a natural digestion process known as enteric fermentation. As a part of the digestion process in ruminants, partially digested food is regurgitated to be chewed again bringing with it methane emissions from the gut, this is commonly known as ‘chewing the cud’. Methane is also released from livestock manure and the management of manure and slurries. Additional to methane, the emissions of nitrous oxide are common on livestock farms through the spreading of fertiliser, bagged or organic, to land which reacts with bacteria in the soil to release nitrous oxide. This also occurs when grazing animals deposit manure across a field. Carbon dioxide (CO₂) is also released on beef and sheep farms through the use of machinery and there are embedded CO₂ emissions from purchased fertiliser, feed and lime.

There has been significant interest in the role of methane in the carbon cycle, with some reports claiming the negative climate effect of livestock agriculture is outweighed by the benefit associated with grazing livestock on permanent pasture and the carbon stored in these grasslands. There is little scientific evidence to support this claim with significant variability across regions, countries, and farms when it comes to soil carbon sequestration. Similarly the lifespan of methane in the atmosphere is often highlighted as a reason for doubt when discussing the warming effect of methane. It is under scientific debate as to what is the best way to account for methane (that persists in the atmosphere for 12 years) versus carbon dioxide (which persists for hundreds of years), as the warming effect of methane in the 12 years it is in the atmosphere is significantly greater than the warming effect of carbon dioxide over its lifetime.

Livestock agriculture does convert carbon into the more potent GHG methane, and as such efforts should limit and reduce the release of methane from livestock agriculture as much as possible.

Mitigation Options

As methane is the major source of emissions on beef farms, the focus should be on emission reduction options. There are 3 categories that most GHG emissions mitigation options fall under to reducing methane in livestock:

• Improved efficiency through management changes

This will ultimately create a more efficient beef production system and improve the current systems output, spreading the emissions across a greater output of beef.

• Avoided emissions through management changes

This includes options that change management to avoid emitting current emissions without reducing output, for example improving nutrient management to reduce fertiliser requirements or switching to rotational grazing.

• Novel chemical or mechanical solutions

These are options that act on the livestock themselves or physically capture emissions. An example of the latter is SRUC’s GreenShed project.

The table below outlines some key mitigations that can be undertaken across beef farms to effectively reduce emissions and contribute to a lower carbon agricultural industry.