Environmental impacts of Broiler chicken production in the North Eastern Himalayan region of India: Evaluation using the Life Cycle Assessment approach

The study presents the first comprehensive environmental assessment of broiler chicken production in India, from a cradle-to-farm-gate perspective, using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach. The objective of the study was to identify environmental hotspots in the broiler production system. All inflows and outflows of the broiler production system were mapped to construct the life-cycle inventory. This study uses a system boundary that extends from the cradle to the farm gate. Inventory data for the broiler chicken farms were collected from six different farms, which is typical of the Indian broiler production system, and background data were sourced from the Ecoinvent 3.0 database. For the LCA study, SimaPro (v 9.3.0.3) was used with the ReCiPe 2016 Midpoint impact assessment methodology. For this study, the functional unit of the "1-kg live weight chicken produced was taken into consideration". The environmental impact categories assessed were mainly Global Warming Potential in hundred years (GWP), stratospheric ozone depletion, freshwater eutrophication, terrestrial ecotoxicity, land use, etc. Results showed that broiler chicken feed was primarily responsible for environmental impacts, followed by transportation and electricity. Broiler chicken production had a total GWP of 3.77 kg CO2-eq per kilogram of live weight. Specifically, the energy component of feed, viz., maize production, was the main source of environmental impact. The process of transporting feed and chicks to the broiler farm also had a significant environmental impact. The broiler production system was found to have moderate environmental impacts compared to other published LCA studies of chicken production. Based on the findings of the present study, we proposed actionable items to further improve the environmental efficiency of broiler chicken production in India.