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Mitigation potential of methane emissions in China’s livestock sector can reach one-third by 2030 at low cost

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Abstract

The mitigation of methane (CH4) emissions from livestock production is crucial to China’s carbon neutrality. Here we established a high-spatiotemporal-resolution dataset of the country’s livestock CH4 emissions from 1990 to 2020 using four large-scale national livestock greenhouse gas inventory surveys. We estimate CH4 emissions to be 14.1 ± 2.0 Mt in 2020 and to increase by 13% until 2030 despite CH4 intensity per kg animal protein having decreased by 55% in the past 30 years. Approximately half of the emissions come from 13% of all Chinese counties. The technical CH4 mitigation potential is projected to be 36 ± 8% (4.4–6.9 Mt CH4) in 2030, and reducing food loss and waste could mitigate an additional 1.6 Mt of CH4. Overall, most CH4 mitigation could be achieved by increasing animal productivity and coverage of lagoon storage at carbon prices below US$100 tCO2e−1, being more cost-effective than livestock nitrous oxide mitigation in China.

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Fig. 1: Interannual variabilities and spatial patterns of livestock CH4 emissions across China.
Fig. 2: Spatiotemporal distribution of CH4 emissions from livestock production in China’s six agronomic regions between 1990 and 2020.
Fig. 3: Total CH4 emission and CH4 emission intensities of the animal product.
Fig. 4: CH4 emissions and mitigation from Chinese livestock production in 2030 under different scenarios.
Fig. 5: Abatement cost and CH4 mitigation potentials from livestock production in China for 2030.

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Data availability

The data used to calculate the livestock CH4 emission factor in this paper are available in Supplementary Information, sourcing from the four national livestock greenhouse gas inventory surveys. The historical animal activity data are from published yearbooks, such as the China Agriculture Yearbook, China Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Yearbook and Animal Husbandry Statistics of China. The data from the second China livestock pollution source census are from a non-public database, and these data are available upon request to the corresponding authors. The CH4 emission, animal performance, and import and export data of livestock products from other countries were derived from the FAOSTAT database (http://www.fao.org/faostat/#en/#dat). The basemaps are from National Catalogue Service or Geographic Information (http://www.webmap.cn/). The cost–benefit information is from the published China Agricultural Products Cost–Benefit Yearbook (2021). Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to H.D. Source data are provided with this paper.

Code availability

Microsoft Excel 2021 was used to handle and structure input data. The spatial analysis was conducted using ArcGIS version 10.2. All code is available upon request.

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Acknowledgements

H.D. acknowledged funding from the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC; grant number 32361143865) and the China Agriculture Research System of MOF and MARA (CARS-35-10B). B.G. acknowledged funding from the NSFC (grant numbers 42325707 and 42261144001). Y.W. acknowledged funding from the National Key Research and Development Project of China (2022YFE0138200).

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Yue Wang, Zhiping Zhu, Hongmin Dong.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Environment and Sustainable Development in Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China

    Yue Wang, Zhiping Zhu & Hongmin Dong

  2. College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Xiuming Zhang, Sitong Wang & Baojing Gu

Authors
  1. Yue Wang
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  5. Sitong Wang
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Contributions

Y.W., H.D. and B.G. designed the study. H.D. and Z.Z. provided the national survey data. Y.W. performed the research. Y.W., X.Z., S.W. and B.G. analysed the economic data. Z.Z. prepared the distribution maps. H.D. and B.G. helped to interpret the results. Y.W. wrote the paper, B.G. and H.D. revised the paper and all other authors contributed to the discussion of the paper.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Hongmin Dong or Baojing Gu.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Peer review

Peer review information

Nature Food thanks Xiangwen Fan, Xuejun Liu and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Extended data

Extended Data Fig. 1 CH4 emissions induced by the China’s imported livestock product.

a, The embedded emissions in 2020. b, The embedded emissions in 2030.

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Extended Data Fig. 2 Cumulative Chinese livestock CH4 emissions.

a, Cumulative probability of Chinese livestock CH4 emissions from each county. b, Cumulative probability of Chinese livestock CH4 emissions on aera basis.

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Extended Data Fig. 3 Unit-based mapping of the major animal CH4 emissions.

Basemap from the National Catalogue Service for Geographic Information (http://www.webmap.cn/).

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Extended Data Fig. 4 Historical change of CH4 emission intensity of the major four types of Chinese livestock product from 1990–2020.

a-d, Beef (a), mutton (b), dairy milk (c), and pork (d). The explanations for the fluctuations were explained in Supplementary Text 6.

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Extended Data Fig. 5 Animal protein constitution.

a, Changes in the relative contributions of the major animal product to national produced animal sourcing protein in China for the period 1990–2020. b, Comparison of the constitutions of the animal produced protein in different regions.

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Extended Data Fig. 6 Animal productivity deficit among the top 10 animal CH4 emitting nations.

a–d, beef productivity (a), dairy milk productivity (b), mutton productivity (c), and pork productivity (d). The data are compiled from literature survey (China Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Yearbook10, China Agriculture Research System report18,20, and China Agricultural Products Cost-Benefit Yearbook21, FAOSTAT database3). US, BZ, EU, AU, MX, AG, PK, ET, IN, CN means USA, Brazil, the Europe Union, Australia, Mexico, Argentina, Pakistan, Ethiopia, India, China, respectively.

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Extended Data Fig. 7 Unit-based mapping of the livestock CH4 emissions.

a, manure CH4 emissions. b, enteric CH4 emissions. Basemaps from the National Catalogue Service for Geographic Information (http://www.webmap.cn/).

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Extended Data Fig. 8 Comparison of the per capital consumption of the major ruminant product in different regions.

a–c, beef consumption (a), milk consumption (b), and mutton consumption (c).

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Extended Data Fig. 9 Main framework and databases used in this study.

CAH yearbook represents China Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Yearbook10; Country specific represents EFs calculated based on the national survey data. CAg Yearbook represents China Agriculture Yearbook9; Animal statistics represents Animal Husbandry Statistics of China33.

Extended Data Fig. 10 Locations of the investigated counties in the four national scale animal GHG inventory surveys.

Basemap from the National Catalogue Service for Geographic Information (http://www.webmap.cn/).

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Texts 1–6, Tables 1–22 and Figs. 1–5.

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Wang, Y., Zhu, Z., Dong, H. et al. Mitigation potential of methane emissions in China’s livestock sector can reach one-third by 2030 at low cost. Nat Food 5, 603–614 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01010-0

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