Costs of transitioning the livestock sector to net-zero emissions under future climates

Franco Bilotto, Karen Michelle Christie-Whitehead, Bill Malcolm, Nicoli Barnes, Brendan Cullen, Margaret Ayre and Matthew Tom Harrison ()
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Franco Bilotto: Newnham
Karen Michelle Christie-Whitehead: University of Tasmania
Bill Malcolm: The University of Melbourne
Nicoli Barnes: University of Tasmania
Brendan Cullen: The University of Melbourne
Margaret Ayre: The University of Melbourne
Matthew Tom Harrison: Newnham

Nature Communications, 2025, vol. 16, issue 1, 1-19

Abstract: Abstract Land managers are challenged with the need to balance priorities in production, greenhouse gas (GHG) abatement, biodiversity and social license to operate. Here, we develop a transdisciplinary approach for prioritising land use, illustrated by co-designing pathways for transitioning farming systems to net-zero emissions. We show that few interventions enhanced productivity and profitability while reducing GHG emissions. Antimethanogenic feed supplements and planting trees afforded the greatest mitigation, while revenue diversification with wind turbines and adoption of livestock genotypes with enhanced feed-conversion efficiency (FCE) were most conducive to improving profit. Serendipitously, the intervention with the lowest social licence—continuing the status quo and purchasing carbon credits to offset emissions—was also the most costly pathway to transition to net-zero. In contrast, stacking several interventions to mitigate enteric methane, improve FCE and sequester carbon entirely negated enterprise emissions in a profitable way. We conclude that costs of transitioning to net-zero are lower when interventions are bundled and/or evoke productivity co-benefits.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-59203-5

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