Estimation of Water Requirements by Livestock in Europe

The Blueprint to Safeguard Europe's Water aims to positively contribute to the European Union's Water Policy through a series of studies to assess the quantity and quality of this precious resource. An important part of that water balance is the accounting of water removed from rivers or aquifers by different sectorial needs. The map series presented here shows the water requirements for the livestock sector. These maps are calculated based on livestock density maps for 2005, normalized by the best available field data at continental scale. Water requirements are calculated for these animal categories: cattle, pigs, poultry and sheep and goats. The cattle category is further disaggregated to calves, heifers, bulls and dairy cows. Using values given in the literature, a relationship using air temperature is inferred for the daily water requirements per livestock category. Daily average temperature maps are used in conjunction with the livestock density maps in order to create a temporal series of water requirements for the livestock sector in Europe. This map series is then ingested by the hydrological model along with other water requirements maps for other sectors. The maps cover continental Europe and are generated at 5km resolution.

MUBAREKA Sarah;  MAES Joachim;  LAVALLE Carlo;  DE ROO Arie; 

2013-10-04

ELSEVIER B.V.

JRC79600

2212-0416,   

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S221204161300017X,    https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC79600,   

10.1016/j.ecoser.2013.03.001,