Not all meat and milk is the same: a more sophisticated debate on livestock and the climate needed, says new report

The global picture of livestock’s impacts on climate change has been distorted by faulty assumptions that focus on intensive farming in rich countries, according to a new report published by the PASTRES research programme.

Ahead of the COP26 climate conference and the UN Food Systems Summit, the report, Are livestock always bad for the planet?, warns that important decisions about climate mitigation, food systems and land use – including dietary shifts, tree planting schemes and rewilding – risk being based on partial or misleading evidence.

The report warns that millions of people worldwide who depend on extensive livestock production, with relatively lower climate impacts, are being ignored by debates on the future of food. Low-impact pastoral farming in drylands and mountains has been ‘lumped in’ with much more intensive methods like factory farming, according to the report’s authors, Ella Houzer and Ian Scoones.

Animal-source foods are vital for nutrition in low-income populations, and in places where crop production is not possible, including in many dry and mountainous parts of the world. Changes in meat and milk consumption must focus on the most climate-damaging diets, which are concentrated among a ‘consumption elite’ – often rich people in rich countries.

The report, published by the European Research Council-supported PASTRES programme and 13 collaborating organisations, argues that current debates fail to differentiate between ways of producing livestock products. The report identifies a number of assumptions and gaps in the data on livestock and climate change:

• Data from industrial systems in high-income countries are used to make assumptions about animals in other areas, where patterns of emissions are very different. For example, emission factor protocols proposed by the IPCC, the basis for many assessments, derive from studies of industrialised systems, mostly high-intensity dairy and beef farms. These are very different from the climate impacts of extensive livestock production.
• The impact of different greenhouse gases, with long and short lifetimes in the atmosphere, is also assessed in controversial ways. Methane is a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, but its presence declines quite quickly, usually over 9–12 years. By contrast, CO₂ has less warming potential, but it can stay in the atmosphere permanently. This means that, for example, treating cows and cars as equivalent sources of carbon emissions is misleading in the longer term.
• Global studies of livestock emissions are skewed towards rich countries. For example, a review of 164 Life Cycle Analyses (LCA) of food production was dominated by data from affluent countries. 86% were from Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand, 9% from Asia, 4% from Latin America and only 0.4% from Africa.
• In extensive systems, livestock replace wild herbivores, which also emit greenhouse gases. Pastoral systems may therefore not result in additional emissions from the ‘natural’ baseline. Indeed, some forms of extensive grazing can potentially increase soil carbon stocks.

Report co-author Professor Ian Scoones from the Institute of Development Studies, commented:

“The livestock sector has become the ‘climate villain’ of agriculture. But as global leaders make decisions about the future of food and farming, it’s vital to understand the differences between ways of producing animal products in different parts of the world. While richer consumers should undoubtedly rethink their diets, for many people throughout the world, pastoralism can and should remain part of a low-carbon future.”

The report recommends developing practical solutions to mitigating greenhouse gas emissions including manure manage­ment, grazing mobility and strategies for carbon sequestration. This means working with livestock-keepers, drawing on local knowledge and practices. The report argues that pastoralists must be included in decisions about the future of food and in urgent debates about climate change.

Pastoralism is practised by between 200 and 500 million people worldwide, in very different contexts to industrialised, intensive farming. Pastoralism is important in harsh, highly variable environments in nearly every country of the world, with rangelands making up over half the world’s land surface from the drylands of sub-Saharan Africa to the Arctic Circle.

ENDS//

Notes for Editors

• The report ‘Are livestock always bad for the planet? Rethinking the protein transition and climate change debate’ will be published on 22 September, available online at pastres.org/livestock-report. A short briefing and three accompanying information sheets are also available from the same web page.

• The report will be launched on 27 September at 10:30am CET in an online event. Event details and registration: https://zoom.us/j/81412563305. The event will be chaired by Antonello Franca (Institute for Animal Production in the Mediterranean). Speakers include Ian Scoones (PASTRES), Veronique Ancey (UN FAO), Fernando Garcia Dory (European Shepherds Network), Fiona Flintan (International Livestock Research Institute) and Engin Yılmaz (Yolda Initiative). The event is part of the All4Climate events hosted by the Italian government leading up to the COP26 pre-summit.

• The report is published by the ERC PASTRES project, in collaboration with the Alliance for Mediterranean Nature and Culture (AMNC), the Coalition of European Lobbies for Eastern African Pastoralism (CELEP), the Centre for Sustainable Development and Environment (CENESTA), the European Shepherds Network (ESN), the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), the Italian Network on Pastoralism (APPIA), the League for Pastoral Peoples and Endogenous Livestock Development (LPP), the International Land Coalition’s Rangelands Initiative, the Spanish Platform for Extensive Livestock Systems and Pastoralism, Vétérinaires Sans Frontières (VSF) International, the World Alliance of Mobile Indigenous Peoples and Pastoralists (WAMIP) and the Yolda Initiative. The report is published in support of the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists 2026.
• PASTRES (Pastoralism, Uncertainty and Resilience: Global Lessons from the Margins) is a research programme funded by the European Research Council (ERC). PASTRES aims to learn from pastoralists about responding to uncertainty and resilience, with lessons for global challenges. The programme is co-hosted by the Institute of Development Studies and the European University Institute (see pastres.org).
• The UN’s climate change conference in November (COP26) will renew efforts to limit warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial emissions. The IPCC’s (International Panel on Climate Change) recent scientific report identifies methane as an important driver of short-term warming, with most emissions caused by humans coming from agriculture and waste. These concerns have focused attention on the impacts of animal farming and ways to reduce its contribution to climate change.
• The UN Food Systems Summit takes place on 23 September in New York. The ‘Action Tracks’ to be discussed include shifting to sustainable consumption patterns, boosting nature-positive production, nutrition and equitable livelihoods (see un.org/en/food-systems-summit/action-tracks).