About the project

Norway is to become a low-emission society within 2050, and to reach this goal, there is a high focus on reductions in the emissions from livestock production. Still, the livestock production has an important role in our food production, as the domestic demography limits our growth conditions for food directly consumable to humans. In the Norwegian production of concentrates for livestock, the share of domestic raw material is low for the protein content of the feed, and we are dependent on import of feed ingredients. To increase the domestically produced protein in concentrates, the use of novel feed resources such as yeast grown from wood sugar is explored through Foods of Norway, a Centre for Research-based Innovation at Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

To be able to develop the livestock production for the future, there is a need for more knowledge of the sustainability and the economic viability of livestock production and utilization of novel feed resources. This knowledge should also include a broader spectre of environmental, resource and social aspects, and assess potential trade-offs between climate gas mitigation and other sustainability aspects. LIVESTOCK aims to contribute to sustainable livestock farming in Norway by documenting the sustainability of livestock production through holistic models, approached by life cycle assessment methodology and covering the social and economic aspects. Specifically, the project will document the sustainability of novel feed ingredients in concentrates to ruminants and monogastrics. This will be an important supplement to the research in Foods of Norway and to the future development of climate-smart agriculture in Norway.

LIVESTOCK will also explore various scenarios for future livestock production from domestic feed resources, and explore its foundations stemming from the interaction between primary producers’ decision-making, public regulation and consumer behaviour. The scenarios explored are covering two main directions for domestic livestock production; sustainable intensification (SusInt) and circular food production (FullCirc). In the SusInt scenario, the goal is to maximize the production of animal source food with least input, to cover the increasing demand for food in an increasing human population. In the FullCirc scenario, the aim is to obtain a circular production of animal source food by utilizing the natural resources optimally. The scenarios will be compared based on calculations of e.g. environmental impact, land use efficiency, impact on biodiversity, and the ability to serve the nutritional needs of the human population. At the end of the project, the knowledge from these scenario calculations will make the basis for a multi-objective analysis and evaluation of policy instruments, regulations and incentives, before concluding the main findings in the project.

Participants at NMBU

External participants

Stine Samsonstuen, NORUS
Hanne Møller, NORSUS
Kari-Anne Lyng, NORSUS
Helge Berglann, NIBIO
Ivar Pettersen, NIBIO
Bianca Cavicchi, NIBIO

International partners/participants

Lotta Rydhmer, SLU
Elin Röös, SLU
Marie Trydeman Knudsen, AU
Lisbeth Mogensen, AU
Tove Christensen, CU
Jakob Vesterlund Olsen, CU