The need to graze livestock to meet market demand comes with its fair share of nutritional requirement challenges. Different jurisdictions have different requirements for livestock products based on set quality standards. Therefore, to meet these demands farmers have come up with different grazing techniques to help them meet the demands and the requirements. Even though there are many grazing methods, intensive grazing techniques have increasingly become common. An intensive grazing system plays an important role in improving the number of animals being kept. Over the years, grazing technology has evolved to include more scientific knowledge to improve farmers’ earnings. However, an intensive grazing system does pose several challenges to farmers. One of the greatest challenges for the farmers is the need to meet nutritional requirements for their livestock. Therefore, this report researches the possible challenges posed by intensive grazing systems and possible solutions to the challenges concerning the nutritional requirements of the animals.
Over the years, farmers have developed different grazing methods to meet their livestock demands. Scientific knowledge has come in hand to aid to develop these systems to improve the quality and quantity of products being produced from the rearing of the livestock. However, the modernization of these livestock rearing methods has come with its fair share of challenges. Intensive grazing is the most popular and common grazing method among farmers. Although the method is both labor and capital, the amount of space required for grazing is relatively small (Amidy, Behrendt, and Badgery 2017). This, therefore, makes the method popular among farmers as they can make huge profits from their relatively small pieces of land. Livestock kept in this intensive grazing techniques gain weight fast and mature easily due to the minimized movements and the incorporation of scientific grazing techniques. However, intensive farming techniques have many shortcomings compared to other grazing methods.
To begin with, intensive livestock grazing results in the lack of proper animal welfare. More often than not, the cost-saving techniques employed by the farmers are detrimental to the well-being of the animals. In an intensive grazing system, animals are primarily treated and reared for economic gains. As a result of the economic angle orientation, few factors to enable the wellbeing and health of the animals are overlooked. Although in the recent past there have been efforts to better the wellbeing of livestock under intensive grazing systems, the progress is slow and inconsequential in most regions of the world. The European Union and New Zealand have come up with legislation that recognizes livestock as “sentient beings” thereby according to them some rights (Hall and Hall 2021). These rights include the right to proper nutritional feeding for the animals. The legislation was necessitated by the need to ensure that the animals are well-fed and their nutritional requirements met properly.
Additionally, farmers have incorporated the use of chemicals to speed up the production of feeds for the animals. However, it is important to note that even though these techniques help in meet the animal feeds demands, there are several negative outcomes associated with the practice. First, the fertilizers added into the soil to speed up the growth of the animal feeds eventually percolate through the soil and eventually into underground waters (Fetzel et al. 2017). These contaminated waters eventually find their way into river streams and boreholes. Due to of the consumption of these contaminated waters; there has been a significant rise in the number of water-related illnesses around the world. Further, aerosol sprays used on these intensive grazing farms eventually find their way into the atmosphere leading to the contamination of the ozone layer.
Due to the interference of the ozone layer, there has been a general increase in global temperatures that have caused devastating consequences such as floods and heatwaves. Besides the quest to meet the increasing demand has led to increased emissions into the atmosphere. According to statistics, emissions from the grazing of animals constitute over 14% of total emissions (Voglmeier et al. 2020). These emissions from the intensive grazing sector are far much more than those emitted by the transportation industry into the atmosphere. Therefore, intensive grazing methods are only making an already bad situation worse by increasing the levels of emissions into the atmosphere. The aerosols used in the growing of animal feeds contain harmful elements that work towards depleting the protective ozone layer of the atmosphere.
Apart from the livestock welfare and ozone destruction, nutritional requirement for the animals has resulted in increased use of genetically modified feeds. Genetically modified feeds can withstand harsh climatic conditions and grow to maturity fast. As a result, they have become popular among farmers. However, these genetically modified feeds have had an indirect negative impact on human beings. Once the animals have been fed on these feeds, they ingest the chemicals used to produce the feeds into their systems. The chemicals then build up and accumulate in their bodies over time. These chemicals are then passed on to human beings as they consume the livestock. According to United States Centre for disease control, there is a reported increase in the number of cancer cases related to the consumption of genetically modified foods (Godde et al. 2018). Even though the report is inconclusive on the same; there is a general trend that supports this position.
Whereas there is a need to meet nutritional requirements for animal feeds, there has to be a balanced manner in which this is to be achieved. It has been established that intensified grazing methods have hurt the well-being of the animals. Intensive grazing systems have continuously been carried out on limited grazing spaces thereby impacting negatively the movements of the animals. Additionally, the animals are fed on feeds that are purposely processed to speed up their growth for commercial purposes. This practice should be checked into and changed to ensure that the animals are grazed in conditions that support their wellbeing. Intensive grazing systems should ensure that the animals are grazed on paddocks that are large enough to support the grazing in a manner that ensures the animals are not stressed up (Badgery et al. 2017). Additionally, the adoption of laws such as those in the European Union and New Zealand is a necessary measure to ensure animals’ rights are well protected. Farmers must be taught the need to treat animals in a fair manner that ensures their rights are not violated. Profits must not always supersede the live stocks being grazed.
In addition, intensive grazing methods must be conscious of the environment and ensure that they meet their livestock nutritional needs in an eco-friendly manner. At the moment, intensive livestock grazing is emitting tones of emissions into the atmosphere thereby accelerating the processes of environmental degradation. As a result of the emission of gases into the atmosphere, there has been a significant change in the climatic conditions of the world. Due to increased temperatures, the arctic and polar ice has been melting substantially thereby increasing water levels in the oceans and lakes. The rise in the water levels has resulted in the submergence of towns and cities. In severe cases the submergence of islands leading to loss of property and lives. Additionally, the increased temperatures have resulted in prolonged and increased heat waves around the world. A recent study finding established that there is a direct correlation between increased intensive grazing methods to increasing global temperatures (Bowen, and Chudleigh 2017). Therefore, to correct this negative pattern, farmers must adopt better grazing techniques that are environmentally friendly and at the same time aid in meeting the nutritional requirements of their animals.
One of the easiest methods to implement is the use of animal wastes and manure to generate environmentally friendly fertilizers. Under the intensive farming method, the huge numbers of animals lead to the generation of large volumes of animal wastes and manures. Therefore, farmers should develop an elaborate system that collects these wastes and use them to generate fertilizers. Ecofriendly fertilizers will help the farmers meet their livestock nutritional needs and at the same time help in the conservation of the environment (Clariget et al. 2021). The use of chemicals in intensive grazing techniques is not only unsustainable but also strenuous to the environment. Lastly, farmers must adopt feeds production methods that have little reliance on genetically modified feeds for their livestock. Therefore, the farmers will produce quality livestock products that are safe for human consumption.
In conclusion, intensive grazing techniques are good at aiding in meeting livestock nutritional requirements and improving farmers’ economic position. However, these intensive grazing techniques have negative bearings on the livestock kept. The livestock bred under these conditions undergo measurable levels of stress and their wellbeing is rarely put into consideration. Farmers are keen on achieving certain set economic goals that lead to the poor well-being of the animals. Under intensive grazing methods, there is very limited space allocated to the animals to limit their movements. Hence the livestock lives under stress from their early days to their end. Therefore, there is a need to ensure that countries put in place regulations that ensure livestock in intensive grazing programs are kept under favorable conditions that guarantee their wellbeing.
Additionally, the need to meet the nutritional requirement for livestock in intensive grazing schemes has led to increased use of chemicals in the production chains. Unfortunately, the chemicals used in these intensive grazing units percolate into the soil and lead to the contamination of underground waters. Therefore farmers must adopt feeds growing techniques that ensure there is minimal contamination of the underground waters. Lastly, the use of genetically modified feeds has been on the rise in intensive grazing units. Scientifically the genetic modifiers used on the feeds accumulate in the livestock and eventually find their way into the bodies of human beings. Therefore, the use of genetically modified feeds must be minimized to ensure that consumers are not impacted adversely. A recent study in the United States established that there was a drastic increase in lifestyle-related illnesses from the time at which genetically modified feed began being used.
References List
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Badgery, W., Millar, G., Broadfoot, K., Martin, J., Pottie, D., Simmons, A. and Cranney, P., 2017. Better management of intensive rotational grazing systems maintains pastures and improves animal performance. Crop and Pasture Science, 68(12), pp.1131-1140.
Bowen, M.K. and Chudleigh, F., 2017. Productivity and profitability of a range of alternative steer growth paths resulting from manipulating the pasture feed base in central Queensland–a modelling approach.
Clariget, J.M., Lema, O.M., La Manna, A., Perez, E., Banchero, G. and Fernández, E., 2021. Estimated beef cattle performance under intensive grazing systems in Uruguay. Agrociencia Uruguay [Internet]. 2021 [cited 12-08-2021; 25 (1): e107.
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Hall, C. and Hall, T., 2021. Cattle producer perceptions of their grazing systems in the rangelands of northern Australia.
Voglmeier, K., Six, J., Jocher, M. and Ammann, C., 2020. Soil greenhouse gas budget of two intensively managed grazing systems. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 287, p.107960.