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Increasing importance of precipitation variability on global livestock grazing lands

Nature Climate Change volume 8, pages 214–218 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Pastures and rangelands underpin global meat and milk production and are a critical resource for millions of people dependent on livestock for food security1,2. Forage growth, which is highly climate dependent3,4, is potentially vulnerable to climate change, although precisely where and to what extent remains relatively unexplored. In this study, we assess climate-based threats to global pastures, with a specific focus on changes in within- and between-year precipitation variability (precipitation concentration index (PCI) and coefficient of variation of precipitation (CVP), respectively). Relating global satellite measures of vegetation greenness (such as the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index; NDVI) to key climatic factors reveals that CVP is a significant, yet often overlooked, constraint on vegetation productivity across global pastures. Using independent stocking data, we found that areas with high CVP support lower livestock densities than less-variable regions. Globally, pastures experience about a 25% greater year-to-year precipitation variation (CVP = 0.27) than the average global land surface area (0.21). Over the past century, CVP has generally increased across pasture areas, although both positive (49% of pasture area) and negative (31% of pasture area) trends exist. We identify regions in which livestock grazing is important for local food access and economies, and discuss the potential for pasture intensification in the context of long-term regional trends in precipitation variability.

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Fig. 1: High year-to-year precipitation variability (CVP) is associated with lower cattle densities (upper left) and lower vegetation greenness (lower left).
Fig. 2: Overall, both within- and between-year precipitation variability has increased for global pasture areas.
Fig. 3: Where cattle fed from pasture are important, globally.

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Acknowledgements

L.L.S., L.H.S., J.S.G., P.C.W. and L.G.F. acknowledge the support from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. M.H. and C.G. acknowledge support from the CSIRO Science Leaders Programme. J.S.G., P.C.W. and M.H. were supported by the Belmont Forum/FACCE-JPI funded DEVIL project (Delivering Food Security from Limited Land) (NE/M021327/1) via NSF award no. 1540195. L.L.S. thanks the Early Career Cross-Disciplinary Writing Group.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute on the Environment, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN, USA

    Lindsey L. Sloat, James S. Gerber, Leah H. Samberg, William K. Smith & Paul C. West

  2. School of Natural Resources and the Environment, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, USA

    William K. Smith

  3. Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), St Lucia, Queensland, Australia

    Mario Herrero & Cécile M. Godde

  4. Image Processing and GIS Lab (Lapig), Federal University of Goiás, Campus Samambaia, Goiânia, Goiás, Brazil

    Laerte G. Ferreira

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Contributions

L.L.S., L.H.S., J.S.G. and P.C.W. conceived the idea of the study; W.K.S. and L.G.F. contributed to the remote sensing analysis; J.S.G. helped with coding and analysis; M.H. contributed with livestock density data and grazing concepts; C.G. and L.H.S. helped with the literature review; L.L.S. analysed the data and wrote the manuscript. All the authors contributed to the discussions and writing or revision of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Lindsey L. Sloat.

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Sloat, L.L., Gerber, J.S., Samberg, L.H. et al. Increasing importance of precipitation variability on global livestock grazing lands. Nature Clim Change 8, 214–218 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0081-5

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