THE MEANING OF ‘SUSTAINABILITY’ IN DAIRY CATTLE FARMING. A REVIEW OF THE CONCEPT

Abstract

It is clear that the long-term viability and existence of the planet’s life support systems are seriously threatened by environmental degradation. To address this reality, it is necessary to quantify the impacts of human activities that cause this degradation, particularly food production systems. Assessing these impacts in terms of sustainability is therefore essential to quantify their contribution to the overall problem and to design and implement effective policies, corrective measures and compensation mechanisms. Among these systems, dairy cattle production is one of the most questioned due to its high environmental impacts. The concept of sustainability is very broad and in order to address it, this study aims to examine the different existing narratives for its conceptualization, applied to the dairy sector in particular. To this end, a systematic literature review was carried out, which led to the identification of 56 studies whose common objective was to assess the sustainability of cow’s milk production. The analysis of this literature, carried out using the SALSA protocol, shows the coexistence of several approaches to defining sustainability, considering simultaneously the three dimensions that make it up: environmental, social and economic. The aim of this study is to identify and typify these different ways of approaching the concept of sustainability, as a useful contribution to the subsequent design of standardized frameworks, methodologies and tools, congruent with the diverse contexts in which dairy farming is developing in the areas of origin of the studies reviewed.