Land use for animal production in global change studies: Defining and characterizing a framework.

ABSTRACT: Land use for animal production influences the earth system in a variety of ways, including local-scale modification to biodiversity, soils, and nutrient cycling; regional changes in albedo and hydrology; and global-scale changes in greenhouse gas and aerosol concentrations. Pasture is furthermore the single most extensive form of land cover, currently comprising about 22-26% of the earth's ice-free land surface. Despite the importance and variable expressions of animal production, distinctions among different systems are effectively absent from studies of land use and land cover change. This deficiency is improving; however, livestock production system classifications are rarely applied in this context, and the most popular global land cover inventories still present only a single, usually

SUBMITTER: Phelps LN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5655935 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature