Assessment of sustainability of livestock farming system
- Concept and measurement -
- Part 2 -

Saidur Rahman, Lalhumliana Tochhawng, Nancy Laldinpui, Sumit Kr. Bebnath *

Characterization of Agricultural Indicators 1. Reductionist : A reductionist indicator takes measurements of individual components within a agroecosystem. Seed sourcing, soil fertility, pest/disease control, weed control, and crop management. Nitrogen and phosphorous flows, pesticide use, irrigation, organic matter, energy, crop diversity, soil structure, soil cover, and ecological structures.

Two types of reductionist indicators

a. Primary predictors : A primary predictor has an a priori concept of what sustainable measurement are for various components i.e., soil organic matter, nutrient flow rates, levels of crop diversity, etc. By comparing actual measurements to desired levels, a primary predictor "predicts" the likelihood of a system persisting.

b. Secondary predictors: A secondary predictor examines practices. It also has a priori concept of what the components of a sustainable system should look like, but it focuses on the effect of various practices on individual components. 2. Holistic Indicators A holistic indicator looks for measurements at the systems level that enable a prediction to be made regarding sustainability.

Examples

o Non-negative time trend in output
o Total factor productivity
o Resilience
o Stability

An assessment of sustainability at farm level requires several steps:

1. Selection of probable indicators under different dimensions of sustainability;
2. Prioritization and selection of appropriate indicators based on situation and legal agricultural frame-work of the country/region;
3. Evaluation, ranking and assigning of relative weights to indicators:
4. Quantification (reference value) of indicators;
5. Aggregation of indicator information into an overall contribution to sustainable development;
6. Validation and testing of indicators at farm level.

Measuring Farm Level Sustainability

A sustainability index allows integrated assessments about the sustainability of the system, after taking into account all information provided by indicators. A study contributed for Holstein cow towards the sustainability of dairy system in Brazil and evaluated systems' sustainability at society and system level.

There are ten indicators, namely,
Animal Welfare;
Biodiversity;
Community Health;
Energy;
Farm Financial;
Nutrient Management;
Organic;
Pest Management;
Soil Health Management;
and Water Management were developed.

Few parameters were selected from each indicator category to develop assessment questions. The majority of the questions were structured along a scale, from lowest acceptable or sub-stranded practice to best practice. Scores for all questions were then totalled and evaluated using a red, yellow, and green scale, Green: 81-100 per cent, Yellow: 50-80 per cent; Red: < 50 per cent.

A set of indicators and parameters to measure sustainability of dairy farming was developed. They made a gap-analysis of existing standards/initiatives regarding sustainable (dairy) farming to secure full coverage of the three sustainability aspects (i.e., economic, social and ecological sustainability, resulting in eleven indicators; soil fertility/health, soil loss, nutrients, pest management, biodiversity, farm economics, energy, water, social/human capital, local economy, and animal welfare.

The composite Sustainable Dairy Farming Index (SDFI) was worked out by taking economic, social and ecological indicators. The sustainable value approach with frontier efficiency benchmarks for the assessment of sustainability performance was also combined together for analysis. This approach assessed contributions to corporate sustainability by comparing firm resource productivity with the resource productivity of a benchmark, and this for all resources considered.

The efficiency was calculated by estimating the production frontier indicating the maximum feasible production possibilities. Farm's sustainability taking a systems approach to sustainable farming in resilience thinking with its focus on the interdependence of social and ecological systems was assessed.

They applied this approach to farming by conceptualizing a farm as being part of a set of systems spanning several spatial scales and including agro-ecological, economic and political-social domains. The resilience theory applied to farming provide a more comprehensive route to achieving sustainability and offered rules of thumb as guides to building farm resilience. A holistic method, named DELTA, to assess sustainability for the three aspects: environmental, technical-economic and social was developed.

To identify the indicators, they used a multiple stakeholder perspective (researchers, farmers, advisors). Twenty social indicators were selected and group in four components: quality of life, social integration, farm succession and entrepreneurial skills. Each indicator was validated on 40 farms.

The composite SDFI of dairy farms by using 14 indicators under the three dimensions of sustainability, viz., economic, social and environmental was determined. The composite SDFI of the farms was calculated by taking the weighted average of these three dimensions.

A whole-farm optimization model was used to assess the socio-economic and environmental performance of the sheep farming activity in Greece. The analysis was undertaken in two sheep farms that represented the extensive and the semi-intensive farming systems.

Environmental assessment of agricultural systems and developed reference values (RVs) of farm emissions or energy use per ha that defined hypothetical sustainability thresholds in each of three impact categories viz., climate change, water-quality degradation and non-renewable energy use were conducted.

Conclusion


Sustainability is a dynamic concept and thus not easy to define or to evaluate. There is a need to formulate sustainability indicators in order to better monitor and promote sustainable development of dairy farms. Many models were proposed and applied to assess farm level sustainability but there is little consensus on a universally accepted model for assessing dairy farms sustainability. Several studies, precisely pointed out that there is consensus on how to evaluate sustainable agriculture at the policy level, assessment of sustainability at farm level is not well established.

It is believed that applying multiple criteria in sustainability assessment is problematic, i.e., considering too many indicators can result in difficulties in interpretations. Dairy farming systems are very diverse worldwide and the indicators so selected needs to be country, region and farm specific.

Measurement of farm level sustainability needs a holistic approach that is built on understanding of the interactions, interdependencies and responses under ever changing farming environment.

For further details contact: -
Public Relations & Media Management Cell, CAU, Imphal.
Email: [email protected]


Concluded...