Demanda hídrica da produção de leite em sistema de alimentação à pasto

Abstract

The worldwide demand for animal products has raised concerns about the sustainability of production throughout the whole product life cycle, since large-scale use of water resources is necessary for production. Brazil is one of the world's largest food producers, it is important to assess the environmental impacts of these activities and how to make them more sustainable. Thereby, the goal of this study was to quantify the water consumption in the milk production step within the farm, in the city of Dourados (MS). Thus, information from public databases was used for the production of milk of Girolando cows, in a period of one year. Water for watering of the animals and the water demand of the Brachiaria pasture were considered in a grazing system. The calculation method used was developed by Hoekstra was applied, whereby the sum of water consumption for the production of one liter of milk was 0.708 m3. However, as there are still few studies in Brazil on Water Footprint, it was not possible to make a comparison of the results obtained, however the present work may, through the data obtained, subsidize future research.