Aarhus University Seal

Conference themes

The following areas will be covered at the conference and we welcome abstracts targeted the themes, see guidelines for abstracts here:

1Livestock productionLivestock production accounts for a significant part of agricultural GHG emissions. This calls for a total rethinking towards more holistic and circular livestock production systems as well as the identification of efficient nutritional, genetic and microbial interventions that can drive substantial reductions in enteric methane emissions from livestock and significant improvements in animal feed- and N-efficiency.    
2Manure management and recyclingLivestock manure as well as other wastes and residues are rich in nutrients and organic matter that should be recycled and manure nutrients are together with mineral fertilizers needed in crop production. GHG emission occur during storage and application of manure and wastes applied to soil. All sources of emissions are important when developing low GHG emission technologies and practices, and GHG mitigation strategies must take the interaction between sources into account.     
3Land use perspectivesThe GHG balance varies greatly across agricultural landscapes depending on land use and management with particular hotspots from drained peatlands, but also with large variation in GHG emissions and carbon uptake depending soil and vegetation as well and water flows in the landscape. Further, land use affects the climate through influences on the radiative balance.    
4Crop productionCrop production systems affects the GHG balance, primarily through effects on the nitrogen and carbon cycling affecting nitrous oxide emissions in direct and indirect ways. This calls for development of technologies and crop management  for closing the nitrogen cycle of cropping systems aligned with measures that reduce specific GHG emissions, e.g. from fertilization and residue management.    
5Soil carbon storageSoil stores twice as much carbon as the atmosphere. Thus, even small changes in soil carbon storage significantly affects atmospheric CO2 content. This warrants for the quantification of the soil carbon sequestration potential for different pedo-climatic conditions. And it calls for the development or refinement of soil and crop management measures to increase soil carbon storage by affecting the organic matter input and/or the turnover of soil organic matter in soil.        
6System analysesA holistic approach is needed to evaluate measures aiming at climate-neutral high-intensive agriculture. Therefore, system analyses must be an integrated part of decision making with respect to livestock and crop production, introduction of ZEA technology or management practices. Ideally, a system analysis should determine net GHG reduction, mass balances and cost-efficiency.    
7Monitoring, reporting and verificationAcceptance of measured reduction effectiveness of new technologies and management practices is crucial, and national annual GHG emission inventories is based on accepted principles and methodologies using valid information. The uncertainty of estimates (emission factors) is high as a result of site-specific variation, and not suited for on-farm mitigation. Models are used to estimate emissions and mitigation potentials at the farm level, which may require new online source control of activity data and technologies or new online source control of efficiency.