China's low-emission pathways toward climate-neutral livestock production for animal-derived foods

Rong Wang; Zhaohai Bai; Jinfeng Chang; Qiushuang Li; Alexander N Hristov; Pete Smith; Yulong Yin; Zhiliang Tan; Min Wang

doi:10.1016/j.xinn.2022.100220

China's low-emission pathways toward climate-neutral livestock production for animal-derived foods

Innovation (Camb). 2022 Feb 23;3(2):100220. doi: 10.1016/j.xinn.2022.100220. eCollection 2022 Mar 29.

Authors

Rong Wang¹, Zhaohai Bai², Jinfeng Chang³, Qiushuang Li¹, Alexander N Hristov⁴, Pete Smith⁵, Yulong Yin¹, Zhiliang Tan¹, Min Wang¹

Affiliations

¹ CAS Key Laboratory for Agro-Ecological Processes in Subtropical Region, National Engineering Laboratory for Pollution Control and Waste Utilization in Livestock and Poultry Production, Institute of Subtropical Agriculture, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changsha 410125, China.
² Key Laboratory of Agricultural Water Resources, Hebei Key Laboratory of Soil Ecology, Center for Agricultural Resources Research, Institute of Genetic and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shijiazhuang 050021, China.
³ College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China.
⁴ Department of Animal Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
⁵ Institute of Biological and Environmental Sciences, School of Biological Sciences, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen AB24 3UU, UK.

Abstract

Animal-derived food production accounts for one-third of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Diet followed in China is ranked as low-carbon emitting (i.e., 0.21 t CO₂-eq per capita in 2018, ranking at 145^th of 168 countries) due to the low average animal-derived food consumption rate, and preferential consumption of animal-derived foods with lower GHG emissions (i.e., pork and eggs versus beef and milk). However, the projected increase in GHG emissions from livestock production poses great challenges for achieving China's "carbon neutrality" pledge. We propose that the livestock sector in China may achieve "climate neutrality" with net-zero warming around 2050 by implementing healthy diet and mitigation strategies to control enteric methane emissions.

Keywords: enteric methane emissions; greenhouse gas; healthy diet; methane mitigation; ruminant animals.

Publication types

Review