For the majority of us turkey only hits our dinner plates once a year, but the turkey industry is in fact huge, and is not limited solely to the month of December. Amazingly DEFRA's (2011) Poultry and meat statistics report states the 'carcass weight' of turkey makes up greater the 10% of total poultry production. In many European countries this value is even greater. Because demand for turkey is generally isolated to such a short period of time the market demands huge quantities of turkey be produced all at once. This means the market is generally dominated by industrial farms, owned by large corporations.
In general the environmental impacts related to turkey production are much the same to those of other poultry, including poor management of manure, litter and organic waste like bones and feathers, while also being associated with acidification, eutrophication and of course greenhouse gas emissions (Rodic et al, 2015). Gerber and others (2007) give a very detailed review of poultry related environmental impacts at local and at watershed level scales, with the problems largely boiling down to an excess of waste that cannot be managed by land disposal or recycling. Indeed poultry production's greatest issue is the associated pollution of nearby soil and water with nitrates, heavy metals, drug residues and pathogens. Willaims et al (2006) conducted an interesting study regarding the poultry sector as a whole, comparing organic (free-range) and non-organic (intensive) farming techniques. Curiously, organic poultry production is the only 'organic' animal production system to have more harmful environmental impacts than the non-organic, intensive counterpart. It would be interesting to see if this finding varies between different types of poultry which vary significantly in weight and from which we take different types of produce i.e for chickens we take both meat and eggs.
Perhaps due to the relative isolation of turkey production systems they have seen little academic interest until recently where it has become apparent that agriculture as a whole is having more significant environmental impact. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is an approach that has been used for a number of other farm animals and is gaining traction in the turkey industry also. An LCA involves compiling environmental data for all the activities in an entire process, from birth of the livestock to the supermarket shelf. Environmental impacts are quantified in terms of 'primary energy (PE) use, global warming potential (GWP), eutrophication potential (EP) and acidification potential (AP)'. The tool can then be used to predict the impacts of changes in management or agricultural practice.
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| Source: Andrew Moore's presentation to Perth Green Drinks, 2013 |
I found a couple of studies which focused only on Turkey production, one of which compared the environmental impacts of UK turkey production (Leinonen et al, 2015) and one that modeled the effects of mitigation strategies (Leinonen et al, 2014)
Leinonen and others (2015) compared controlled ventilation and non-controlled ventilation systems for male and female turkeys concerning environmental impact, and is one of the first studies to do so using detailed industry data, provided by the the main UK turkey production companies, which included figures for energy consumption, amount and type of feed and bedding, and final turkey weight. The study found the main variables affecting environmental impacts were feed conversion ratio (i.e the efficiency of turkeys), housing and manure emissions and slaughter weight (which is related to energy use per turkey).
The 2014 project modeled the effects of various mitigation strategies. One of these strategies is the replacement of soybean feed with rapeseed or sunflower feeds which both have lower land use change implications and can be imported from much close therefore cutting emissions from travel. While the theory behind this technique is sound the model showed no significant difference in environmental impacts, in large part due to the lower efficiency of the new feeds, therefore the birds would not grow to the same size. Another of the strategies was to adjust stocking density i.e bird weight / land area. As expected lowering stock density had greater environmental impact, particularly in terms of global warming potential. The most successful mitigation strategy was to use manure as fuel rather than as a fertilizer. The technique poses obvious biosecurity risks however it proved particularly advantageous in the model regarding acidification and eutrophication potential.
The 2014 project modeled the effects of various mitigation strategies. One of these strategies is the replacement of soybean feed with rapeseed or sunflower feeds which both have lower land use change implications and can be imported from much close therefore cutting emissions from travel. While the theory behind this technique is sound the model showed no significant difference in environmental impacts, in large part due to the lower efficiency of the new feeds, therefore the birds would not grow to the same size. Another of the strategies was to adjust stocking density i.e bird weight / land area. As expected lowering stock density had greater environmental impact, particularly in terms of global warming potential. The most successful mitigation strategy was to use manure as fuel rather than as a fertilizer. The technique poses obvious biosecurity risks however it proved particularly advantageous in the model regarding acidification and eutrophication potential.
Final thoughts...
Festive themed post today looking at a Christmas-specific agricultural industry. I was surprised to see there is work being done in such a specific area and one article I read was keen to point out that the relatively small size of the turkey industry, dominated by only a few large farms, allows it to make efficiency and environmental impact changes easily in comparison to other agricultural industries in a time where there is increasing pressure on companies to do so. Poultry is particularly damaging to soil and water, and it the specific pressures of turkey being popular only at certain times of the year provides unique problems. Research in this area highlights the specificity required when looking at mitigation strategies within agriculture, even between similar agricultures industries such as those of poultry.
Festive themed post today looking at a Christmas-specific agricultural industry. I was surprised to see there is work being done in such a specific area and one article I read was keen to point out that the relatively small size of the turkey industry, dominated by only a few large farms, allows it to make efficiency and environmental impact changes easily in comparison to other agricultural industries in a time where there is increasing pressure on companies to do so. Poultry is particularly damaging to soil and water, and it the specific pressures of turkey being popular only at certain times of the year provides unique problems. Research in this area highlights the specificity required when looking at mitigation strategies within agriculture, even between similar agricultures industries such as those of poultry.
interesting post Finn, very topical indeed!
ReplyDeleteThanks Rhona!
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