‘While greenhouse gas emissions of cattle excreta vary by diet, breed and other factors, measurements found that commonly used Tier 1 emission factors consistently overestimated actual emissions.

Cattle keeping in Kenya (photo credit: CCAFS/C Schubert).

Cattle keeping in South Africa (photo via StormSignal on Flickr).

‘Using the state-of-the-art laboratory established in 2015 in Nairobi called the Mazingira Center, scientists are measuring greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture in Africa, key to improving the accuracy of emissions data for both national reporting and mitigation.

Cattle keeping in Zimbabwe (photo credit: ICRISAT/Swathi Sridharan).

‘Already, scientists found that Tier 1 emission factors established by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) overestimate both methane and nitrous oxide emissions from cattle excreta, given typical smallholder practices in Eastern Africa.

Cattle keeping in Sudan (photo via Rita Willaert on Flickr).

‘In the paper, Methane and nitrous oxide emissions from cattle excreta on an East African grassland…