Improvements to dairy farms for environmental sustainability in Grana Padano and Parmigiano Reggiano production systems

Figures & data

Figure 1. System boundary that describes the farm system was analysed and inputs and outputs were taken into account in LCA.

Table 1. Main inventory data about the on-farm field cultivation area. The sum of the land area dedicated to each crop is given as absolute value (ha) and as percentage of the total area of farms analysed in the study.

Crop	Farms for GP		Farms for PR
	Area (ha)	Area (%)	Area (ha)	Area (%)
Maize for silage	491	33.7	158	7.2
Alfalfa	410	28.1	1385	63.6
Wheat	138	9.5	241	11.1
Cereals mix	95.2	6.5	71.8	3.3
Maize for ear silage	82.8	5.7	0.0	0.0
Italian ryegrass	79.9	5.5	107	4.9
Grass	44.2	3.0	78.3	3.6
Soybean and pea	44.2	3.0	34.0	1.6
Maize for grain	32.7	2.2	36.8	1.7
Other cereals (*)	38.0	2.6	66.1	3.0
Total	1455	100	2177	100

Note: (*) barley, triticale, common millet, foxtail millet, sorghum, oat and other minor cereals.

GP: Grana Padano; PR: Parmigiano Reggiano.

Table 2. Main inventory data about herds and milk production.

Variable	Unit	Farms for GP		Farms for PR
		Mean	SD	Mean	SD
Total number of cows	n.	161.3	108.0	96.3	80.1
Lactating cows	n.	138.6	93.4	81.9	67.9
Delivered milk	t/year	1609	1163	841	802
Milk per cow	kg/d	29.8	6.11	25.6	5.37
FPCM per cow	kg FPCM/d	30.2	4.32	25.0	4.71
Fat	%	3.89	0.14	3.74	0.16
Protein	%	3.38	0.08	3.34	0.10
Dairy Efficiency	kg FPCM/kg DMI	1.35	0.26	1.15	0.22
Dry Matter Intake	kg DMI/d	22.1	1.61	22.3	2.35
IOFC	€/d per cow	12.85	3.84	11.43	3.63

GP: Grana Padano; PR: Parmigiano Reggiano.

Table 3. Average environmental impact of 1 kg FPCM produced by the farms that sell milk to each of the four dairies for GP cheese production.

Impact category	Unit	Dairy 1 GP	Dairy 2 GP	Dairy 3 GP	Dairy 4 GP	GP
		Mean	Mean	Mean	Mean	Mean	SD
CC	kg CO2 eq	1.33	1.604	1.381	1.31	1.379	0.325
POF	kg NMVOC eq·10^−2	0.16	0.212	0.159	0.162	0.17	0.057
TA	molc H^+ eq	0.023	0.025	0.022	0.024	0.023	0.005
FE	kg P eq·10^−4	0.729	0.945	0.74	0.738	0.773	0.297
ME	kg N eq·10^−2	0.732	0.855	0.713	0.781	0.768	0.184
TE	molc N eq·10^−1	0.997	1.096	0.955	1.04	1.024	0.205
LU	kg carbon deficit	18.96	22.23	19.18	18.18	19.32	7.083
MFRD	kg Sb eq·10^−5	0.622	0.804	0.609	0.637	0.658	0.267

GP: Grana Padano; CC: climate change (kg CO₂ eq); POF: photochemical oxidant formation (kg NMVOC eq); TA: terrestrial acidification (molc H+ eq); FE: freshwater eutrophication (kg P eq); ME: Marine eutrophication (kg N eq); TE: terrestrial eutrophication (molc N eq); LU: land use (kg carbon deficit); MFRD: mineral, fossil and renewable resources depletion (kg Sb eq).

Table 4. Average environmental impact of 1 kg FPCM produced by the farms that sell milk to each of the four dairies for PR cheese production.

Impact category	Unit	Dairy 1 PR	Dairy 2 PR	Dairy 3 PR	Dairy 4 PR	PR
		Mean	Mean	Mean	Mean	Mean	SD
CC	kg CO2 eq	1.376	1.579	1.388	1.513	1.455	0.374
POF	kg NMVOC eq·10^−2	0.166	0.176	0.162	0.17	0.169	0.047
TA	molc H^+ eq	0.026	0.03	0.026	0.024	0.027	0.007
FE	kg P eq·10^−4	0.811	0.69	0.819	0.762	0.772	0.246
ME	kg N eq·10^−2	0.804	0.886	0.767	0.828	0.82	0.229
TE	molc N eq·10^−1	1.135	1.297	1.156	1.033	1.177	0.321
LU	kg carbon deficit	24.78	20.84	20.66	19.41	21.78	11.43
MFRD	kg Sb eq·10^−5	0.524	0.611	0.558	0.588	0.567	0.188

PR: Parmigiano Reggiano; CC: climate change (kg CO₂ eq); POF: photochemical oxidant formation (kg NMVOC eq); TA: terrestrial acidification (molc H+ eq); FE: freshwater eutrophication (kg P eq); ME: Marine eutrophication (kg N eq); TE: terrestrial eutrophication (molc N eq); LU: land use (kg carbon deficit); MFRD: mineral, fossil and renewable resources depletion (kg Sb eq).

Table 5. Results of the factor analysis. In bold are reported the loading values with the main relevance on the factors (>0.6 as absolute value).

Factor pattern	Factor 1	Factor 2	Factor 3
	Climate change and efficiency	Livestock units	Farm dimension and animal intake
Climate change (kg CO2 eq)	0.82	−0.03	0.39
Field emissions (kg/ha)	0.64	−0.49	0.29
Animal emissions (kg/ha)	0.77	−0.35	0.21
Manure/slurry storage emissions (kg/ha)	0.39	−0.30	0.19
Feed purchased (t/y)	0.67	0.44	0.25
Dry matter intake (kg DMI/d)	−0.26	0.01	0.64
Dairy efficiency (kg FPCM/kg DMI)	−0.84	0.21	−0.15
Total cows (n)	−0.59	0.26	0.61
Land area (ha)	−0.63	−0.15	0.65
Stocking rate (LU/ha)	0.23	0.83	−0.04
Daily milk per lactating cow (kg/cow)	−0.87	0.22	0.17
Production self-sufficiency (%)	−0.15	−0.63	0.07
Nitrogen balance (kg/ha)	0.34	0.83	0.11
Phosphorous balance (kg/ha)	0.37	0.80	0.10

Figure 2. Results of the PCA analysis with three components.

Table 6. Means and standard deviations for the main variables that define the six clusters.

Variables	Cluster
	1		2		3		4		5		6
	Mean	SD	Mean	SD	Mean	SD	Mean	SD	Mean	SD	Mean	SD
Dairy efficiency^a	1.06	0.21	1.29	0.20	1.28	0.19	1.10	0.25	1.35	0.17	1.32	0.15
Cows (n)	44.3	11.9	95.3	13.7	151.6	19.8	53.6	21.0	203.5	17.2	310.4	45.2
Stocking rate (LU/ha)	3.59	1.97	3.57	1.93	3.34	1.35	1.64	0.92	4.20	1.95	3.55	0.94
Production self-sufficiency (%)	56.9	15.2	60.8	15.6	67.1	19.4	98.2	11.4	57.6	13.4	63.1	18.9
Farms to GP (%)	21.4		37.5		60		62.5		40		50
Farms to PR (%)	78.6		62.5		40		37.5		60		50

^a DE = kg FPCM/kg DMI.

Table 7. Results of GLM with LSMEANS values per farm characteristics.

Variables	LSMEAN of clusters						SD error	P model	Contrast
	1	2	3	4	5	6
	n = 28	n = 16	n = 10	n = 8	n = 10	n = 8			1 2 3 versus 4	5 e 6 versus 4	All versus 4
Forage in rations (% DM)	59.0	53.2	53.1	62.1	50.6	50.6	2.32	0.0021	0.02060	0.00071	0.00311
N balance (kg/ha)	458	382	386	232	468	387	108	0.7387	–	–	–
P balance (kg/ha)	71.89	43.75	44.77	15.30	71.15	52.51	25.39	0.6251	–	–	–
Land area (ha)	16.56	43.02	68.76	46.07	78.97	124	6.74	0.0000	0.7033	0.0000	0.0187
IOFC (€/d per cow)	7.04	8.77	9.32	6.32	9.53	10.01	0.67	0.0006	0.0184	0.0004	0.0024
Daily FPCM (kg/ha)	21.57	24.19	24.89	10.35	31.52	26.91	3.39	0.0065	0.0032	0.0002	0.0005
Daily FPCM (kg/cow)	24.93	29.59	30.66	22.74	30.32	31.48	1.25	0.0000	0.0007	0.0000	0.0001

FPCM: fat and protein corrected milk.

Table 8. Results of GLM with LSMEANS values per impact category.

Variables	LSMEAN of clusters						SD error	P model	Contrast
	1	2	3	4	5	6
	n = 28	n = 16	n = 10	n = 8	n = 10	n = 8			1 2 3 versus 4	5 e 6 versus 4	All versus 4
CC	1.423	1.371	1.439	1.914	1.260	1.301	0.099	0.002	0.00018	0.00002	0.00003
POF	0.0017	0.0016	0.0017	0.002	0.0014	0.0016	0.000	0.001	0.00003	0.00002	0.00001
TA	0.025	0.026	0.025	0.027	0.022	0.022	0.002	0.407	–	–	–
FE	0.00008	0.00007	0.00007	0.00011	0.00006	0.00007	0.000001	0.008	0.00174	0.00032	0.00040
ME	0.008	0.008	0.008	0.010	0.007	0.007	0.001	0.100	0.01848	0.00346	0.00566
TE	0.111	0.113	0.111	0.119	0.097	0.096	0.008	0.417	–	–	–
LU	22.27	19.24	19.41	26.60	17.69	17.72	3.289	0.456	–	–	–
MFRD	0.000006	0.000005	0.000006	0.000009	0.000005	0.000006	0.0000002	0.003	0.00031	0.00038	0.00014

GLM: general linear model; CC: climate change (kg CO₂ eq); POF: photochemical oxidant formation (kg NMVOC eq); TA: terrestrial acidification (molc H+ eq); FE, freshwater eutrophication (kg P eq); ME: Marine eutrophication (kg N eq); TE: terrestrial eutrophication (molc N eq); LU: land use (kg carbon deficit); MFRD: mineral, fossil and renewable resources depletion (kg Sb eq).

Figure 3. Hotspot processes of every cluster to CC impact category. All processes included in the study are reported in the legend.

CC: climate change.

Figure 4. Hotspot processes of every cluster to FE impact category. All processes included in the study are reported in the legend.

FE: freshwater eutrophication (kg P eq).

Figure 5. Hotspot processes of every cluster to LU impact category. All processes included in the study are reported in the legend.

LU: land use (kg carbon deficit).

Figure 6. Hotspot processes of every cluster to MFRD impact category. All processes included in the study are reported in the legend.

MFRD: mineral, fossil and renewable resources depletion (kg Sb eq).