The social networks of manureshed management

Abstract

Manureshed management—the strategic use of manure nutrients that prioritizes recycling between livestock systems and cropping systems—provides a comprehensive framework for sustainable nutrient management that necessitates the collaboration of many actors. Understanding the social dimensions of collaboration is critical to implement the strategic and technological requirements of functional manuresheds. To improve this understanding, we identified aspirational networks of actors involved in manureshed management across local, regional, and national scales, principally in the United States, elucidating key relationships and highlighting the breadth of interactions essential to successful manureshed management. We concluded that, although the social networks vary with scale, the involvement of a common core set of actors and relationships appears to be universal to the successful integration of modern livestock and crop production systems necessary for functional manuresheds. Our analysis also reveals that, in addition to agricultural producers, local actors in extension and advisory services and private and public sectors ensure optimal outcomes at all scales. For manureshed management to successfully integrate crop and livestock production and sustainably manage manure nutrient resources at each scale, the full complement of actors identified in these social networks is critical to generate innovation and ensure collaboration continuity.

Challenges and opportunities for manureshed management across U.S. dairy systems: Case studies from four regions

“…Incentivizing the practices that New Mexico dairy producers have already built via social networks and farm‐to‐farm manure redistribution may be the best option for realizing a future in which systematic manureshed management meets a diversity of environmental and economic goals (e.g., Meredith et al., 2022). Government cost‐sharing or consumer payments for products from farmers that demonstrate manureshed management can help ensure these networks exist into the future.…”

Envisioning the manureshed: Toward comprehensive integration of modern crop and animal production

“…Further, demand for manure products or needed services can be quickly saturated as manureshed management is upscaled; value‐added technologies alone do not achieve the regional resource balances needed to achieve a manureshed. The lessons from these animal industry challenges are not that manureshed management cannot be implemented and sustained, but rather that manureshed management requires concerted, adaptive coordination across a range of stakeholders (Meredith et al., 2022; Uutiset, 2018).…”

“…Meredith et al. (2022) reasonably posit that engagement across the network of actors is foundational to the success of a manureshed. They identify existing and potential partnerships of manureshed actors to be engaged at different scales of management (Figure 4a).…”

“…For manureshed social networks (Meredith et al., 2022) and relocation programs (Duke & McGrath, 2022) to succeed, data are required to support standardization of assessment, routine interaction of partners, and transparency of outcomes. A variety of datasets are used regularly to perform national and global assessments of nutrient budgets tied to agriculture (IPNI, 2012; Spiegal et al., 2022a; Statistics Canada, 2020; USDA‐NASS, 2017).…”

Recycling nutrients in the beef supply chain through circular manuresheds: Data to assess tradeoffs

“…Successful circular manuresheds require substantial initial investments to transform existing management practices, trade structures, and social networks, with coordinated and collaborative efforts beyond any one animal or feed producer (Kleinman et al., 2019; Meredith, Spiegal, Kleinman, & Harmel, 2022; Sharara et al., 2022; Spiegal et al., 2021). Weighing tradeoffs among different types of sustainability goals (production, environmental, socioeconomic) is essential to predict returns on such investments (Harrison et al., 2021).…”