Exploring the emissions intensity of Scottish sheep and cattle livestock farms

Research based on a pilot study that linked farms in the Scottish Farm Business Survey to SAC’s Agrecalc carbon calculator has published results measuring emissions intensity and farm-level technical efficiency in the beef and sheep-meat sectors in Scotland.

The research finds that there is a high level of variance in emissions intensity in Scotland’s beef and sheep farms with a number of very high and very low emitters operating in cattle and sheep farms. However, the relationship between farm-level technical efficiency and emissions intensity differs between farm types. With a higher amount of variance in emissions intensity attributable to specialist sheep farms compared to cattle or mixed farms. For these farms herd-level factors, such as breed and age structure will also be an important component of emissions intensity.

For more information and to download the full briefing visit the briefing page here