Peter Ettema, Chief Advisor to the Deputy Director-General, Māori Partnerships and Investment at New Zealand's Ministry for Primary Industries and current chair of the FAO LEAP Steering Committee, shares his insights on livestock sustainability and the role of the FAO LEAP Partnership in driving positive change.

What are the main challenges and opportunities in making livestock practices more sustainable and eco-friendly today? How does the FAO LEAP initiative contribute to this transition?

The main challenges lie in developing and implementing policies and programmes that balance various needs. Livestock farmers need to earn a viable income, communities require access to highly nutritious animal proteins, and environmental outcomes must improve, including reducing greenhouse gas emissions and building climate resilience. This balance is constantly at risk due to the impacts of a rapidly changing climate, geopolitical issues, increasing production costs, and insecure supply chain and trade routes. However, there is much greater awareness at global, national, and local levels about the need for sustainable livestock practices and the vital role that livestock agriculture plays in food security, poverty reduction, and sustainable development. Programmes such as FAO Livestock Environmental Assessment and Performance (LEAP) partnership, the Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases, and the Global Agenda for Sustainable Livestock are driving this awareness. These initiatives bring governments and key partners together to measure and understand the impacts of livestock practices and find common solutions that local communities can implement effectively. The FAO LEAP Partnership contributes to this transition by developing comprehensive science-based guidelines that build awareness and understanding of the connections between the environment and the livestock sector. These methodologies and guidance are designed for use by stakeholders in all countries and across a wide range of feed and livestock production systems. This helps develop policies and practises that are relevant to national and local contexts. This approach is crucial, as the implementation of new or improved practices occurs at the farm-level.

The FAO LEAP Partnership is developing new guidelines on ecosystem services and the circular bioeconomy. What are your expectations for these guidelines once they are published?

These guidelines reflect the importance of understanding the interconnections between livestock production systems, their associated supply chains, and the wider environment. Like previous FAO LEAP guidelines, these new guidelines will support countries and the international livestock sector in understanding these connections and identifying opportunities to improve the environmental sustainability of livestock supply chains. Dissemination and ensuring people have the skills to understand them within their local contexts remain key issues.

What role do governments play within the FAO LEAP Partnership, and why is this cluster contribution so important?

Governments are critical to the FAO LEAP Partnership in two important ways. First, they provide ongoing funding to support the development and dissemination of new and existing guidelines, and they support scientists and sector experts to be part of Technical Advisory Groups. Second, governments act as critical enablers by providing opportunities to disseminate and use the guidelines. This dual role is essential for the success and impact of the FAO LEAP Partnership and its role in supporting sustainable livestock production systems.

The FAO LEAP initiative has been active for over 10 years and is now launching its 5^th phase. What are your thoughts on the partnership’s achievements over the past decade, and what directions should FAO LEAP focus on in the next phase?

Since its inception, the FAO LEAP Partnership has been a global leader in building a deeper understanding and seeking ways to improve the sustainable development and environmental sustainability of the livestock sector through better assessment methods, metrics, and data. Central to this has been a shared commitment of this goal across the membership. This has led to a unique and comprehensive suite of globally agreed guidelines, based on the most up-to-date science and covering almost every area where the livestock sector and the environment connect. It’s a fantastic achievement for everyone involved! A taskforce is being established to help set the direction for the next two years (LEAP 5). While I don’t want to pre-empt the outcome of the taskforce’s work, I do see opportunities to increase the awareness of the FAO LEAP programme and use the published guidelines. This could be done through expanding the country membership and investing in translating the guidelines to make them available to a much wider audience. I also see greater opportunities to strengthen our relationship with other global initiatives, including the Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases, and the Global Agenda for Sustainable Livestock under the FAO Sustainable Livestock Transformation framework.

How is the New Zealand government, specifically the Ministry for Primary Industries, working to accelerate the sustainable transformation of livestock practices?

New Zealand must consistently innovate and improve the sustainability of production on-farm and across all primary industry sectors. This ensures the production of outstanding products while respecting the environment and remaining competitive on the world stage. New Zealand produces significantly more food than it consumes, exporting around 90 percent of what it produces. Food and fibre alone account for more than 82 percent of New Zealand’s total exports. As environmental impact has become of increasing interest to customers, retailers, consumers, and markets, the Ministry for Primary Industries has been supporting farmers to achieve key sustainability goals. These include producing low-emission agrifood products, meeting national greenhouse gas targets under the Climate Change Response Act 2002 and the Zero Carbon Act 2019, and investing in research and technology to assist farmers in measuring, monitoring, verifying, and reporting their environmental impact and the sustainability of farming practices. In 2023, the New Zealand government and major agribusiness companies established AgriZeroNZ as a world-first public-private partnership to drive product development and the commercialisation of emission reduction tools and technologies for agriculture for New Zealand’s pasture-based farms.

About Peter Ettema

Peter has worked for the New Zealand Government for 20 years, including the Ministry for Primary Industries and Department of Conservation. Raised on a dairy farm, he has extensive experiences in the agricultural sector both in New Zealand and through agricultural development projects in East Africa and the Pacific. Since 2015, Peter has represented New Zealand on the FAO LEAP Steering Committee and supported experts on technical advisory groups for guideline development. He is currently the Chief Advisor to the Deputy Director-General, Māori Partnerships and Investment at the Ministry for Primary Industries and is the current chair for the FAO LEAP Steering Committee. Peter holds a Bachelor of Agricultural Science and a Master of Environmental Management, with key areas of work including climate change, sustainable land and environmental management, and extension capability across the food and fibre sector.