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•California is the nation's leading producer of market sheep
•Most sheep in CA spend at least part of their life on rangeland, as part of a wide variety of diverse systems
•The environmental impact of these systems is unknown
•Life cycle assessment (LCA) and carbon footprint calculations can be used to measure the efficiency and environmental impacts of livestock production
•California-specific LCAs have been conducted (e.g. Stackhouse-Lawson et al. (2012) for beef production and DeLonge(2016) for wool)
•The environmental impact of sheep meat production in other countries has been studied, but not for the US
•Reducing carbon footprint is highly correlated with increasing production efficiency and profitability
•A case study based method will allow for the calculation and comparison of the carbon footprints of different production system types
•Baseline resource use and carbon footprint data from different sectors of the California sheep industry would allow producers to assess current environmental impacts
•This data would help producers improve production efficiency and reduce environmental impact while maintaining the health of native rangelands |
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