How soil can benefit from livestock farming

Despite the common narrative regarding the negative effects that animal agriculture has on the planet and its climate, livestock are, in fact, important components in the maintenance of soil health.

- Janine Ryan

Climate change and climate-change mitigation have become buzz phrases over the past five to 10 years, with the call for more direct action from global citizens to limit the impact of human activities on the climate.

This has been particularly highlighted by various organisations that have called for people to limit the amount of meat they consume, or eliminate meat from their diets altogether.

The idea behind this is that livestock are important and significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions, which have led to global warming and, inevitably, climate change.

However, despite the claims of such naysayers, cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry have been shown to have a positive impact on the environment.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that there isn’t any room for improvement in livestock production, and many farmers are, in fact, at the forefront of sustainable agricultural innovation.

Thus, in this article, Farmer’s Weekly looks at the positive contributions that keeping livestock makes to the environment and soil health in particular,

BREAKING UP COMPACT SOIL

Increasing numbers of farmers are incorporating livestock into their grain operations, says Michelle Rook, a journalist for AgWeb. This move, she says, is for the benefit of these farmers’ soil.

In a November 2022 article, Rook spoke to Mike Winkler, a soil conservationist at McCook in Nebraska, US, about the agronomic benefits of running cattle on a farm. He explained that the cattle’s hoof action breaks up toplayer compaction which, if left unresolved, could hamper water infiltration and soil aggregate stability, among other problems.