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The environmental impact of agriculture is the effect that different farming practices have on the ecosystems around them, and how those effects can be traced back to those practices. [1] The environmental impact of agriculture varies widely based on practices employed by farmers and by the scale of practice.
[211] [212] A study summarising a number of impact studies of climate change on agriculture in Latin America indicated that wheat is expected to decrease in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. [212] Livestock, which is the main agricultural product for parts of Argentina, Uruguay, southern Brazil, Venezuela , and Colombia is likely to be reduced.
Pollutants from agriculture greatly affect water quality and can be found in lakes, rivers, wetlands, estuaries, and groundwater. Pollutants from farming include sediments, nutrients, pathogens, pesticides, metals, and salts. [1] Animal agriculture has an outsized impact on pollutants that enter the environment.
Traditional rice cultivation is the second biggest agricultural methane source after livestock, with a near-term warming impact equivalent to the carbon dioxide emissions from all aviation. [73] Government involvement in agricultural policy is limited due to the high demand for agricultural products like corn, wheat, and milk. [74]
Extremes matter because agricultural productivity is driven largely by environmental conditions during critical threshold periods of crop and livestock development. Improved assessment of climate change effects on agricultural productivity requires greater integration of extreme events into crop and economic models.
Examples of environmental impacts of animal agriculture: Meat production is a main driver of deforestation in Venezuela; Pigs in intensive farming; Testing Australian sheep for exhaled methane production to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture; Farms often pump their animal waste directly into a large lagoon, which has environmental consequences.
Similarly, an older study found that if 1.1 °C (2.0 °F) of warming occurs between 2005 and 2045 (rate comparable to hitting 2 °C (3.6 °F) by 2050), then under the current livestock management paradigm, global agricultural costs would increase by 3% (an estimated $145 billion), with the impact concentrated in pure pasturalist systems.
Sustainable agriculture provides a potential solution to enable agricultural systems to feed a growing population within the changing environmental conditions. [6] Besides sustainable farming practices, dietary shifts to sustainable diets are an intertwined way to substantially reduce environmental impacts.