Estimation of enteric methane emission factors for Ndama cattle in the Sudanian zone of Senegal
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Estimation of enteric methane emission factors for Ndama cattle in the Sudanian zone of Senegal S. Ndao 1,2
&
E. H. Traoré 3 & A. Ickowicz 2,4,5 & C-H. Moulin 2
Received: 14 January 2020 / Accepted: 22 April 2020 # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Methane (CH4) emission estimations for cattle in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) reflect limited production levels and diets that are high in cellulose forage. However, data on these livestock systems is lacking for their accurate evaluation. To provide guidance for climate change mitigation strategies in Senegal, it is necessary to obtain reliable estimates of CH4 emissions from Ndama cattle reared in grazing systems, which is the predominant cattle system in the country. The objective of this study was to determine the annual methane emission factor (MEF) for enteric fermentation of Ndama cattle following the IPCC Tier 2 procedure. Our estimated annual MEF at the herd scale was 30.8 kg CH4/TLU (30.7 kg CH4/head/yr for lactating cows and 15.1 kg CH4/head/yr for other cattle). These values are well below the default IPCC emission factor (46 and 31 kg CH4/head/yr for dairy and other cattle, respectively) proposed in the Tier 1 method for Africa. Our study showed that feed digestibility values differ with season (from 46 to 64%). We also showed that cattle lose weight and adapt to lower feed requirements during the long dry season, with a resulting major reduction in methane emissions. The results of this work provide a new framework to reestimate the contribution of grazing systems to methane emissions in Africa. Keywords Enteric methane . Emission factor . Taurine cattle . Mixed system . Senegal
Introduction In addition to providing an essential source of proteins in the human diet, accounting for up to 33% of total protein (Herrero et al. 2013), livestock production is also responsible for 12% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions (Havlík Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11250-020-02280-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * S. Ndao [email protected] 1
ISRA, Centre de Recherches Zootechniques de Kolda, BP 53, Kolda, Sénégal
2
SELMET, Univ Montpellier, CIRAD, INRA, Montpellier SupAgro, Montpellier, France
3
ISRA, Laboratoire National de l’Elevage et de Recherches Vétérinaires, BP 2057, Dakar, Sénégal
4
PPZS, Pastoral Systems and Dry Lands, Centre ISRA Hann, BP 2057, Dakar, Sénégal
5
CIRAD, UMR SELMET, F-34398 Montpellier, France
et al. 2014). Ruminants in particular produce large amounts of methane (CH4) during their normal digestive processes. Emissions per gram of protein from cattle are 250 times higher than emissions per gram of protein from legumes (Tilman and Clark 2015). For this reason, considerable debate is ongoing about the role of livestock husbandry as a major producer of greenhouse gases (GHG) and the significance of its contribution to climate change. Among ruminants, cattle are the largest emitter of CH4 because their
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