A Pathway to Carbon Neutral Agriculture in Denmark

Acknowledgment of advice and information does not imply endorsement of any or all of the report or conclusions, which are solely the reponsibility of WRI and of the authors. [...] To test likely net effects, we Yet even if the world’s present high meat and modeled the emissions intensity of Danish dairy milk consumers greatly change their diets, world and pork production and compared them with consumption of meat and milk is still likely to those of other major national producers of pork and rise by 2050 because of a projected increase in dairy. [...] Following our global Reducing production of meat and dairy in strategy in Creating a Sustainable Food Future, a Denmark—which is relatively climate-efficient Denmark carbon neutral agriculture strategy should compared to other countries—is not likely to lead to greatly reduce production emissions but can rely on less consumption of meat and dairy because people land sparing and reforestation to of [...] Global consumption from the production process, such as those from of pork and dairy is rising rapidly, and our global using fertilizer and managing manure, and those projections for future consumption assume that that represent the carbon costs of Denmark’s “land almost two thirds of the population in 2050 carbon footprint.” consumes per person from one half to one quarter of the overall meat, mi [...] Total production emissions almost 1.5 million tons due to its use of straw (a also include 1.5 million tons from energy use in by-product of cereal production) for bioenergy that agriculture (including emissions from production displaces fossil fuels and due to soil carbon gains of fertilizer), and 4.8 million tons from the ongoing estimated by Denmark in excess of some emissions degradation of dr