Umweltwirkung von Bio-Betrieben: Ursachen und Optimierungsmöglichkeiten

Summary

Agriculture has manifold impacts on the environment and plays an important role in
the environmental impacts of food chains. Previous studies have shown that organic
farming can reduce these environmental impacts. But also within organic farms there
is a high variability in their impacts on the environment. In our case study with five
organic dairy farms, the farm with the highest energy demand used over 2.5 times
more energy than the farm with the lowest energy demand. This indicates that further
optimisations are possible. Therefore, the farmer is an important factor. The efficient
use of his own resources together with an adept combination of different branches can
contribute to the ecological optimisation of his farm. But for every farm and every
environmental impact, different means of productions play a crucial role. For a longterm
reduction of the environmental impacts of a farm a holistic, individual and
detailed analysis considering all impacts of the life cycle is essential.