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Light is cast on a long shadow

Nature Climate Change volume 2, pages 705–706 (2012)Cite this article

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The fields of climate change and livestock research have not always been cosy bedfellows. But they are ironing out their difficulties and looking ahead.

The livestock research community did not appreciate the storm of media attention that this whipped up. Many researchers also disputed how the FAO had done its sums. To this day, much of what the FAO does is considered in the wake of its first big stride into the field of greenhouse-gas hoof-prints. “The reactions were very extreme,” says Irene Hoffmann, who works on livestock biodiversity at the FAO, and who was not involved in the report. “Then others came out with livestock as contributing about 50% of all greenhouse-gas emissions, or hardly anything at all. And there was a period of denial in parts of the agricultural community.”

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Figure 1: Greenhouse gas emissions in livestock production.

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  1. Anna Petherick is a freelance journalist based in Devon, UK,

    Anna Petherick

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  1. Anna Petherick
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Correspondence to Anna Petherick.

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Petherick, A. Light is cast on a long shadow. Nature Clim Change 2, 705–706 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1703

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