Trade-offs associated with on-farm ammonia emission abatement practices in specialised pig farms

The livestock sector accounts for a large proportion of ammonia emissions from agriculture. Livestock farms can adopt various practices to reduce on-farm ammonia emissions, however, the available literature often neglects on-farm costs and other environmental impacts of these practices, and thus potential trade-offs. To fill this gap, we developed a multi-criteria assessment system with 35 indicators to analyse trade-offs between ammonia reduction, on-farm costs and further environmental impacts of on-farm ammonia emission abate- ment practices in specialised pig farms. Our analysis showed that all considered practices were beneficial for the environmental category “air”, while for the other categories mixed effects occurred. High-cost practices were usually more effective in reducing ammonia emissions and other environmental impacts, while low-cost practices tended to cause different trade-offs. Thus, on-farm costs can often serve as a rough orientation for the environmental effectiveness of abatement practices.