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Muñoz-Ulecia, EnriqueAuthor

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Exploring the productivity per unit of livestock, land and labour of organic multi-species livestock farms in six European countries

Publicated to:Farming System. 100187-100187 - 2025-10-31 (), DOI: 10.1016/j.farsys.2025.100187

Authors: Enrique Muñoz-Ulecia; Myriam Grillot; Marc Benoit; Guillaume Martin

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Abstract

Farm diversification is increasingly suggested as a way to improve agriculture’s productivity and sustainability. However, the role of livestock remains under-explored, particularly whether diversification of organic farms with multiple livestock species increases productivity. We assessed the livestock, land and labour productivity of 96 organic multi-species livestock farms in six European countries. We aggregated farm’s production of commercialized crop and livestock products in a unit of agricultural production (kg of protein) and an economic unit (income in €). We then calculated agricultural productivity of each farm per unit of livestock (LSU), land (ha) and labour (AWU). We also calculated the livestock productivity (kg of protein per LSU) of each livestock enterprise (dairy cattle, beef cattle, meat sheep, dairy sheep, goats, poultry and pigs) on each farm. We found that most organic multi-species livestock farms are as productive as their specialised counterparts per unit of livestock, land and labour, with medians of 103.8 kg of protein/LSU, 91.2 kg of protein/ha and 2,214.7 kg of protein/AWU, respectively. Farms that included a monogastric species had higher agricultural productivity than those that included ruminant species alone (i.e., cattle and sheep). The high variability among farms and livestock species requires nuancing the view of diversification as a silver-bullet strategy and exploring the factors that promote or hinder the success of livestock diversification to increase productivity. This study provides the first comparison of agricultural and economic productivity of organic multi-species commercial farms across six European countries and including seven livestock combinations.

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