Climate Change and Animal Agriculture Interactions in
Mediterranean Region*
1NazanKOLUMAN1*, SerapGÖNCÜ1
1 Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agiculture, Cukurova University, Turkey
*Corresponding Author: nazankoluman@gmail.com
Abstract
The environment of livestock production, agricultural crops and related management practices developed over the past 10,000 years is significantly changing due to human-induced CC. Currently, even countries located within the temperate zone are affected by changes in global warming. Farm animal production systems and considerations on strategies of adaptation to global warming and climate change, which are in mutual interaction with each other, have become recently a popular subject on the public agenda and scientific literature. The main conclusions that can be made is that uttermost scenarios of climatic change will negatively affect the dairy and meat industry and that the contribution of farm animals to the both industries will increase in proportion to the severances of changes in environmental temperature. Heat stress (HS) imposed by high ambient temperature in temperate zones such as Germany, northern Italy or the United States was identified in recent years as a major factor which has a negative impact on milk production, reproduction, and the optimum health score of dairy cows. HS has also shown to increase appreciably the cow's mortality in those areas. On the other hand, there is no evidence that dairy goat production in temperate zones is affected so far; though evidence for such effects was noticed in deserts and Mediterranean countries.
The aim of this paper to evaluate climate change and animal agriculture interactions in the Mediterranean Region.
Keywords:Farm animals, Climate change, Mediterranean region. Introduction
Recent accelerated climate change has exacerbated existing environmental problems in the Mediterranean Basin that are caused by the combination of changes in land use, increasing pollution and declining biodiversity. For five broad and interco nnected impact domains (water, ecosystems, food, health and security), current change and future scenarios consistently point to significant and increasing risks during the coming decades (Cramer et al., 2018). The “food” is naturally the only indispensable input of life for humanity. Accordingly, agricultural activities involving food production and the nature- agriculture relationship have always been on the agenda. As mentioned above, the intensive use of conventional inputs in the nature-agriculture cycle and the oppression on natural
resources have caused agriculture to be put under responsibility and questioned in the process of climate change, as well. The animal and crop productions, as well as the methods which are applied in the course of these productions, should be firstly considered with regard to amounts of greenhouse gas emission. The problems such as inability to come up with an alternative to stubble burning and similar activities, the lack of an appropriate diet and use of high-quality feed in animal breeding and the pollution which emerges during the production and animal transfer processes should be taken into consideration in the process of climate change. At this point, conventional or traditional production systems will become another issue to be discussed (Koluman et al. 2019).
The climate change is likely to create indirect impacts on the quality and the amount of animal feeds, feeding strategies, seasonal usability of grasslands, genetic studies (hybridization, etc.) and the number of animals,. The quality and quantity of animal feed is important with regard to the rations prepared. The grain (wheat, barley, etc.) which is used as animal feed and oily seed residues (cottonseed residues, sunflower seed residues, etc.) ensure that the rations are prepared with the lowest cost without losing any nutritional value (Koluman Darcan et al. 2009).
Climate change will have impacts on Mediterranean animal production in some ways; these namely are the physical and biologic environments and the climate and chemical environments as given in Figure 1.
Physical environment Nutrition Grassland conditions Housing conditions Biologic environment Microorganism s Toxins Drinking water ANIMAL Climate Temperature Relative humidity Air movements Precipitation Dust Chemical Environment Waste gases Manure Other wastes
Figure 1 Classification of expected effects of climate change on animal production (Koluman
Darcan et al. 2019)
The impacts of global warming on Mediterranean farm animals emerge as the physical environment, biological environment, chemical environment or direct climate impacts. The physical environmental conditions appear with possible changes in the feeding conditions.
The sheltering becomes more costly due to extreme climate conditions (too warm or too cold) and certain qualities aimed at performance such as milk and meat productivity are likely to lag behind. It was put forth by the studies conducted that extreme climate conditions have an impacton animals in terms of the milk quality and quantity and cause a decrease in the lactation period of milkers (Chase and Sniffen 1988; Bucklin et al. 1991). The studies conducted on the reproductive performance versus climate change report that the fertility decreases (Alnamier et al. 2002; De Rensis et al. 2002) and in turn the estrous cannot be clearly determined. Subsequently, the first insemination interval (days) increases together with the decreasing pregnancy rate (Alnamier et al. 2002; De Rensis et al. 2002) and the blood flow into the uterus decreases in parallel due to the high atmospheric temperature. Increase in body temperature leads to a rise in the uterus temperature which decreases the fertilization rate limits and the embryonic development aggravating early embryonic fatalities (De Rensis et al. 2002). It has also been reported that young animals’ growth and development are also negatively affected by these conditions (Darcan 2005; Çoban et al. 2008; Koluman Darcan et al. 2009). Furthermore, it was reported that the high environmental temperature reduces voluntary feed intake, feed efficiency and extended fattening period (Linn 1997; Harner et al. 1999; Silanikove 2000; Davis et al. 2001a, b; Göncü and Özkütük 2003).
The grassland or crop production and its quality will slump down due to the decrease in water resources and the land availability for crop production. There will be tendencies towards producing food which are aimed at firstly feeding human on available lands, as the lands appropriate for crop production will shrink due to the increasing sea-water level, drought or salinity (Koluman et al., 2019).
Extreme high temperature
Extreme low temperature
Rising humidity Changining precipitation
Rising up sea level Decreasing ground water level
Rising up soil salinity
Grassland and grassland crops
Dwarf
Woody Long rooted Fleshy-leaved
Figure 2 Effects of climate change on grassland (Koluman et al, 2019)
The competitive power of the animal feed production will decrease due to economic reasons and priorities of general agricultural and industrial activities. Accordingly, a decrease
in this competitive power will primarily emerge by the feeding problems in animals. As the precipitation regime changes, some cultivated lands will suffer drought, whereas some others will experience salinity. Thus there will be competition with regard to the feed crop and alternative plants on lands consisting of agricultural production and the cost will be a prominent issue at this point. Furthermore, short, woody and leafy plant species with long roots appropriate to store water which are resistant to salinity and draught will become prominent in vegetation. These plant species are among the special species which could be efficiently utilized by goats (Koluman Darcan et al. 2009).
The studies on the genetic improvement of farm animals in terms of production qualities and productivity have always been on the agenda. But local animals’ capacity of maintaining their productivity in all circumstances and their advantageous situation with regard to negative environmental impacts should be taken into consideration. Therefore the work on genotype should be based on selection. The qualities of local gene resources such as length of life, animal health and productivity have an impact on the greenhouse gas emission, and thus they will be able to maintain their advantages over hybrid stocks even under climate changes. Furthermore, they are less affected by short heat waves due to their anatomic and physiological structures and they easily excrete the extra heat with the help of their mechanisms and thus maintain their body temperature. The considerably good quality of their resistance to heat and cold has been especially put forth by certain studies. Besides the productivity level, the length of life could also be affected by climate changes. An increase in such incidents as drought, flood and epidemic diseases is expected due to the climate change. Therefore it’s important to start using animals which are resistant particularly to drought and diseases in production. The characteristics aimed at adaptation such as the skin and hair type, sweat gland capacity, reproduction rate and ability to maintain productivity in difficult conditions, resistance to local diseases and parasitic infestation, metabolic heat production, tolerance to draught, anatomic and morphologic structure are some important impacts which are likely to derive from climate changes (Koluman Darcan et al. 2019).
A serious threat in stockbreeding will be posed by certain animal diseases in terms of treatment expenses, productivity losses and immunity (blue tongue, gastroenteritis, etc.). Many factors such as easier spread of disease vectors and an increase in atmosphere temperature due to shorter cold seasons with temperatures above 15°C will play a role in the emergence of these diseases with subsequent problems. The goats are the animals with high resistance to diseases and external parasites. They are also likely to be more resistant to disease vectors which will change under the drought and extreme climate conditions in the future than others. The social and economic impacts of global warming are quite likely to be serious such as the lack of food under limited natural resources. Accordingly, conventional resources will become widespread in production and conventional methods will be developed and used in order to gain higher productivity from the unit area. Thus the imbalanced and unhealthy nutrition is likely to occur. It’s known that animal protein is considerably important especially with regard to the body and mental health of the human organism. Therefore, the provision of the continuity in animal production should be considered as part of the healthy society perspective (Koluman Darcan et al. 2009).
Besides the productivity level, the length of life could also be affected by climate changes. An increase in such incidents as drought, flood and epidemic diseases is expected
particularly to drought and diseases for animal production. The local gene resources are more advantageous than exotic breeds particularly in terms of resistance to diseases, ability to utilize bad vegetation and endurance to drought. The native animals are able to use the plants rich in lignin effectively by consuming less feed and water.
The genetic diversity in farm animals is important with regard to food safety and rural development. The applications which are carried out towards these ends will provide stockbreeders with the advantage of animal selection and new genotype development with regard to climate change, varying market opportunities and turning towards new fields which are needed by people. FAO (2007), reported that a great number of animal stocks in the world were under the threat of perishing. The majority of these animals are raised at small enterprises which are run with low inputs, where the plant and animal production based on grasslands is performed simultaneously.
The direct impacts of climate change on animals are caused by climate factors with direct impacts on physiology such as atmosphere temperature, relative humidity and wind speed. The animals’ reactions to changing climate conditions differ, depending on being a ruminant or non-ruminant and their climate comfort zones (Koluman Darcan et al. 2009).
Certain applications, particularly those aimed for improving the environment and genotype will become prominent. An ability to lessen the impact of climatic conditions would be closely associated with goat’s milk and meat production capacity and the economic trait of production (Darcan and Güney, 2002; Darcan and Çankaya, 2008). Thus, two factors, genetic capacity and mitigation of heat stress, will dictate to large extent the level of productivity per goat and the number of goats in harsh environment. Therefore, actions to improve environmental stress should be put into practice by taking current conditions into account. Present experiences indicate that applying methodologies to mitigate climatic stress are of principal importance in terms of profitability (Güney et al., 2006, Koluman Darcan et al.,2011).
Results
For alleviation negative impacts of climate change the factors need to be taken into consideration in selection programs are the length of productive life which depend on the ability to resist CC and epidemic diseases. These consideration emphasize the importance of benefiting from the genetic potential of local animals, which are most cases the most resistant breed to drought and diseases under given condition. In addition to the physiological factors discussed above, such as ability to maintain productivity in difficult conditions, low metabolic heat production, tolerance to water deprivation and anatomic and morphologic structure which enable efficient utilization of low quality feeds,skin and hair type, sweat gland capacity, reproductive capacity and, resistance to diseases and parasites, are important factors, which will allow goat to adapt effectively to climate change. And grassland structures and alternative feed sources could be taken into consideration to find out new nutritional programmes for farm animals.
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