Sistemi foraggeri per migliorare la sostenibilità ambientale dell'azienda zootecnica da carne.

Despite beef production is called to fight against daily news on his greenhouse gas (GHG) emission, FAO ensures that in the next years the consumption of animal products will increase because of an increase of population of developing countries. Most famous countries for livestock breeding are in the American continent. Only Brazil provides 15% of meat request of the world. The possibility to improve environmental sustainability in these countries can reduce the environmental impact of livestock breeding all over the world. In Brazil animals grazing their whole lifetime even at the finishing period. This can reduce the feeding efficiency because in some periods of the year, the quality of the grazing fiber is lower. This reduction can shift the ruminant microflora in a methanogenic way.Higher amount of methane can increase the ecological footprint of livestock breeding, which is now at 18% of all world GHG emission. Improved fiber quality can also enhance average daily gain (ADG) of animals and lower age at slaughter. Some studies ensure that an improved pasture management can minimize the carbon-footprint (CF) from 14,4 kg CO2eq kg carcass-1 to 1,6kg CO2eq kg carcass-1 and diminish the use of land by 90%. Another way to reduce the CF of livestock breeding is to create new carbon sinks in each farm soil. As an example, planting Eucaliptus can accumulate in 10 years of growing period more CO2 than those produced by animals. In Canada, another role playing country in terms of extensive breeding, finishing animals are fed with grains and hay but this feeding is too much expensive to be used with pregnant cows which are fed with perennial pasture. But in this environment pasture is not available during winter period. A solution to improve grazing periods is the use of cereal-grazing and of the swath-grazing technique.Cereals, oat and barley, are grazed at soft dough stage in early autumn or in vegetative stage in early spring. Swath grazing is a technique that allows to graze cutted and swathed cereal leavedin the field also under snow or ice. The cold temperature and the compression at the soil enable forage to maintain his qualitative and quantitative properties. Avoiding grains use in pregnant cows winter feeding allows the reduction of energy consumption for a tonne of feed production from 2,03 GJ to 0,62 GJ.