Recoupling livestock and feed production in the Netherlands to reduce environmental impacts.

In many places on earth, livestock and feed production are decoupled, as feed is grown in one region and fed to livestock in another. This disrupts nutrient cycles by depleting resources in feed producing regions and accumulating resources in livestock areas, which leads to environmental degradation. One solution is to recouple livestock and feed production at a more local level, which enhances nutrient circularity.

Food system by-products upcycled in livestock and aquaculture feeds can increase global food supply.

Many livestock and aquaculture feeds compete for resources with food production. Increasing the use of food system by-products and residues as feed could reduce this competition. We gathered data on global food system material flows for crop, livestock and aquaculture production, focusing on feed use and the availability of by-products and residues.

The compatibility of circularity and national dietary recommendations for animal products in five European countries: a modelling analysis on nutritional feasibility, climate impact, and land use.

Background: National food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) are generally designed from a human health perspective and often disregard sustainability aspects. Circular food production systems are a promising solution to achieve sustainable healthy diets. In such systems, closing nutrient cycles where possible and minimising external inputs contribute to reducing environmental impacts.

Circularity in animal production requires a change in the EAT-Lancet diet in Europe.

It is not known whether dietary guidelines proposing a limited intake of animal protein are compatible with the adoption of circular food systems. Using a resource-allocation model, we compared the effects of circularity on the supply of animal-source nutrients in Europe with the nutritional requirements of the EAT-Lancet reference diet. We found the two to be compatible in terms of total animal-source proteins but not specific animal-source foods; in particular, the EAT-Lancet guidelines recommend larger quantities of poultry meat over beef and pork, while a circular food system produces mainly milk, dairy-beef and pork.

Paludiculture as paludifuture on Dutch peatlands: An environmental and economic analysis of Typha cultivation and insulation production.

Paludiculture, the cultivation of crops on rewetted peatlands, is often proposed as a viable climate change mitigation option that reduces greenhouse gas emissions (GHGe), while simultaneously providing novel agricultural business options. In West Europe, experiments are ongoing in using the paludicrop cattail (Typha spp.) as feedstock for insulation panel material.

Defining a land boundary for sustainable livestock consumption.

The need for more sustainable production and consumption of animal source food (ASF) is central to the achievement of the sustainable development goals: within this context, wise use of land is a core challenge and concern. A key question in feeding the future world is: how much ASF should we eat? We demonstrate that livestock raised under the circular economy concept could provide a significant, nonnegligible part (9-23 g/per capita) of our daily protein needs (~50-60 g/per capita). This livestock then would not consume human-edible biomass, such as grains, but mainly convert leftovers from arable land and grass resources into valuable food, implying that production of livestock feed is largely decoupled from arable land.