A farmer-friendly solution to cut cattle methane emissions

Source: Indian Express

What is the news:  ICAR develops a feed supplement that reduces emissions and also boosts milk production.

Contribution of cattle in methane emissions

• Methane is a more potent greenhouse gas that has a global warming potential of 25 times of carbon dioxide (CO2) over 100 years.
• An average lactating cow or buffalo in India emits around 200 litres of methane per day.
• Belching cattle, buffaloes, sheep, and goats in India emit an estimated 9.25 million tonnes (mt) to 14.2 mt of methane annually.
• The 2019 Livestock Census showed India’s cattle population at 193.46 million, along with 109.85 million buffaloes, 148.88 million goats, and 74.26 million sheep.
• Ruminants in industrialized countries are given more easily fermentable/digestible concentrates, silages, and green fodder. It helps in reducing methane production.
• Whereas, in India, Ruminants are largely fed on agricultural residues (wheat/paddy straw and maize, sorghum, or bajra stover) and it tends to produce 50-100% higher methane.

How Methane is produced in cattle?

• Methane is produced by animals having rumen.
• Rumen is the first of their four stomachs where the plant material they eat (cellulose, fibre, starch, and sugars) gets fermented by microorganisms prior to further digestion and nutrient absorption.
• Carbohydrate fermentation leads to the production of CO2 and hydrogen.
• These are used as substrates by archaea microbes in the rumen. It has a structure similar to bacteria to produce methane, which the animals then expel through burping.

What is ‘Harit Dhara’ and how it can reduce methane produced by cattle?

• Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) institute has developed an anti-methanogenic feed supplement ‘Harit Dhara’.
• Harit Dhara is prepared using condensed and hydrolysable tannin-rich plant-based sources abundantly available in the country.
• Tropical plants containing tannins (bitter and astringent chemical compounds) are known to suppress or remove protozoa from the rumen.
• Harit Dhara acts by decreasing the population of protozoa microbes in the rumen. Which is responsible for hydrogen production and making it available to the archaea for reduction of CO2 to methane.

How ‘Harit Dhara’ can be economically beneficial to Farmers?

• It provides much of the energy for lactose (milk sugar) production and body weight gain, there is an economic benefit, too, from feeding Harit Dhara.
• According to experts, feeding 500 g Harit Dhara to lactating cattle and buffaloes would increase milk output by 300-400 ml/animal/day.
• Compound animal feed manufacturers can also incorporate it into their products by replacing wheat or de-oiled rice bran.
• If given to bovines and sheep, it not only cuts down their methane emissions by 17-20%, but also results in higher milk production and body weight gain.