Environmental impact of the typical heavy pig production in Italy

Abstract

The Italian pig sector is mainly focused on the production of heavy pigs used for the traditional drycured hams. At slaughter a minimum of 160 kg and 9 months age are required to comply with the production specifications of the ham consortia. Advancing livestock age and increasing fat deposition negatively affect feed conversion ratio, which is one of the main determinants of meat production environmental impact. The aim of the study was to provide a first evaluation of the environmental impact potentials of heavy pig production in Italy through a Life Cycle Assessment approach.Additional objectives were to identify the main hot spots and the most important data gaps in the analysis. A cradle to farm gate Life Cycle Assessment was performed in 6 intensive pig farms located in Northern Italy. Key parameters concerning on-farm activities, inputs and outputs were collected through personal interviews to the farmers. The functional unit was 1 kg liveweight. Direct land use change was considered in the emissions of imported soybean. The average pig slaughter liveweight was 168.7±33.3 kg. Environmental impacts per kg liveweight were generally higher than those generated in the production of pigs slaughtered at a lighter weight. The global warming potential was on average 4.25±1.03 kg CO2 eq/kg liveweight. Feed chain (crop production at farm and purchased feed) was the major source of impact for all the categories and the most important hotspot of heavy pig production. Farm size and reproductive efficiency are important factors in the environmental burden of heavy pig production: the largest and most efficient farm (as liveweight produced per sow) had impact potentials per kg liveweight much lower than those generated in the less efficient farm and similar to the ones reported on pigs slaughtered at a lower weight. The wide range of impact values within farms reveals opportunities for environmental improvements in the production of the traditional heavy pig. There is a need for further data and models on methane enteric emissions and nitrogen excretions above 100 kg of liveweight. HIGHLIGHTS Italian typical dry-cured ham production needs high pig weight and age at slaughter  Environmental impacts of heavy pig through the Life Cycle approach were assessed  Data were collected through personal interviews in 6 pig farms located in Northern Italy  Heavy pigs have impacts of per kg liveweight generally higher than light pigs  The wide range of impacts within farms reveals opportunities for GHG mitigation

Organic Farming as a Strategy to Reduce Carbon Footprint in Dehesa Agroecosystems: A Case Study Comparing Different Livestock Products

“…This feature that is so inherent to the dehesa is the one differentiating these systems from those in the research available on pig's CF, which are intensive systems, such as that of Arrieta and González [64] who found a CF value of 5.14 and 5.17 ton CO 2 eq/ton LW in paddocks and of 6.06 and 6.04 ton CO 2 eq/ton LW in confinement. Other papers such as that of Bava et al [76] in Italy, found that for traditional ham-producing intensive pig farms, the CF calculated for six farms yielded an average of 4.25 ± 1.03 kg CO 2 eq/kg of live weight. The results reported in this paper take into account the GHG emissions attributed to soy and its transport.…”

Life Cycle Assessment of Iberian Traditional Pig Production System in Spain

“…In recent years, environmental impacts of traditional pig production were estimated by several authors [9,[11][12][13][14][15]. The values (Table 6) Consumption of natural resources (chestnuts, acorns and grass) in LCA was only previously considered by Monteiro et al [15] who calculated the emissions from grazing in different systems using local breeds.…”

“…Recent studies focusing on alternative systems, such as organic [7][8][9][10] or traditional pig production [11,12] highlighted that such systems usually have higher impacts than conventional ones. Indeed, they use more compound feeds than conventional systems and fatten pigs to a heavier live weight of elder pigs at slaughter.…”

ASPA 22nd Congress Book of Abstracts

“…The Italian pig sector is mainly focused on the production of heavy pigs, with higher environmental impacts than light pigs. Bava et al (2017) reported a wide variability in the environmental impact categories considered in 5 commercial farms of Northern Italy; for instance, GWP ranged from 2.7 to 5.8 kg CO 2 eq/kg LW of heavy pigs, as compared to an average of 3.1 kg CO 2 eq/kg LW of light pigs calculated from 12 studies reported by the authors. In the heavy pig production, feeds, especially protein sources, have the highest impact and some feeding strategies, such as lowering the dietary crude protein according to the physiological phase and supplementing diets with amino acid, should be implemented (Galassi et al 2010;Schiavon et al 2015).…”