Globally, the demand for meat products is growing at 1.8% per year due to increasing populations, economic growth and rapid urbanization. Agropastoral and pastoral systems cover 45% of the earth’s usable surface and supply 9% of global meat production, while mixed crop-livestock farming systems produce 54% of the total meat and 90% of the milk consumed in the world.

This demand for livestock products is expected to grow but climate change and competition for land is likely to limit the area available for livestock keeping. What are the options to feed more people, more efficiently from livestock farming?

Mario Herrero, a senior systems analyst with the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) will give a presentation on ‘livestock and global change’, at the ILRI Nairobi campus InfoCentre, on 28 November 2012, from 1500-1600 hours.

View the event announcement:

Herrero leads ILRI’s Sustainable Livestock Futures group that conducts foresight studies on emerging livestock development challenges with uncertain future impacts and signals their importance for other ILRI programs and policymakers.

Mario Herrero, team leader for ILRI’s Sustainable Livestock Futures program (photo credit: ILRI).

He has coordinated several global integrated assessment projects such as the CGIAR global assessment of food production systems, ecosystems services and human well-being. Additionally, he has contributed to numerous international assessments such as the 2010 World Development Report, the 2007/2008 Human Development Report and the 2007 Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture. He has participated in international task forces such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC’s) Task Force on Greenhouse Gas Emissions Guidelines and has served in several donor and science advisory committees on livestock and the environment.

Herrero has published more than 150 refereed papers, book chapters and reports in his areas of expertise and is currently on the editorial board of Agricultural Systems and is a guest editor for the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal (PNAS) in the area of livestock, sustainability science and global change. He has also supervised over 60 academic theses on different aspects of animal production systems.

View Mario Herrero’s publications here: http://mahider.ilri.org/handle/10568/1/search?query=herrero&rpp=10&sort_by=2&order=DESC&submit=Go

‘Livestock live talks’ is a seminar series at ILRI that aims to address livestock-related issues, mobilize external as well as in-house expertise and audiences and engage the livestock community around interdisciplinary conversations that ask hard questions and seek to refine current research concepts and practices.

All ILRI staff, partners and donors, and interested outsiders are invited. Those non-staff who would want to come, please contact Angeline Nekesa at a.nekesa[at]cgiar.org (or via ILRI switchboard 020 422 3000) to let her know. If you would like to give one of these seminars, or have someone you would like to recommend, please contact Silvia Silvestri at s.silvestri[at]cgiar.org (or via ILRI switchboard 020 422 3000).