Abstract
The sustainable development of animal-derived products is one of the greatest challenges for next years, due to the increasing pressure on the livestock sector to meet the growing demand of a growing population, but at the same time reducing the resource requirements and the environmental impacts, safeguarding animal welfare. Therefore, the environmental, social, and economic sustainability of livestock farms are widely acknowledged in the European Green Deal and in the Italian PNRR (Piano Nazionale di Ripresa e Resilienza) where the transition to sustainable food production is recognised as a key element for the future development of the planet. Strong efforts are cur-rently being made to convert livestock farms to more sustainable management, but there is still a long way to go. In the procedures tools nowadays used to assess the sustainability of farms, animal health and welfare are usually neglected or not organically integrated despite the numerous validated protocols existing their assessment. Thus, innovative approaches should be developed that account also for these issues with a “One Sustainability” perspec-tive, therefore taking into account each “ecosystems” involved in animal production: the environment, the animals, and the humans. The main objective of the project is to define and develop a tool, based on a big data approach, integrating the different assessments of the different ecosystems and dimensions (environmental, economic, so-cial) of sustainability for dairy cow farms for a prospective decision-making aiming at a comprehensive optimiza-tion. The novel “One Sustainability”-oriented method will have a multidisciplinary and integrated approach to as-sess the overall farm sustainability to improve the dairy sector resilience and performances. To achieve these ob-jectives, the project will be developed during 24 months and organised in seven work packages (WP) in which three research units (Universities of Bologna, L’Aquila and Teramo) will share their tools and expertise. The WP1 (Project coordination and management) will assure the coordination, management, and delivery of the project. In WP2, WP3 and WP4 at least 40 different dairy cow farms located in northern Italy will be assessed in situ for the detec-tion of housing conditions, animal welfare and health, and the socio-economic situation. Ethical perception of the consumers for dairy farming will also be assessed in WP4. In WP5 (One sustainability approach) the data collected in WP2-WP4 will be elaborated and used for sustainability assessment for each ecosystem (i.e., environment, ani-mals, and humans) using existing and well-known tools. In WP6 (Better actions), a rationale, robust and effective numerical method based on big data analytics will be developed to integrate the data from the three different eco-systems. As for WP7, it will be specifically dedicated to dissemination and communication of results of the project.
Dettagli del progetto
Responsabile scientifico: Marco Bovo
Strutture Unibo coinvolte:
Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Agro-Alimentari
Coordinatore:
ALMA MATER STUDIORUM - Università di Bologna(Italy)
Contributo totale di progetto: Euro (EUR) 202.236,00
Contributo totale Unibo: Euro (EUR) 99.273,00
Durata del progetto in mesi: 24
Data di inizio
12/10/2023
Data di fine:
28/02/2026
