Assessment of livestock greenhouse gases in Colombia between 1995 and 2015

The livestock sector in Colombia significantly participates in national economic dynamics but makes significant worldwide contributions to greenhouse gas emissions. Hence, climate change mitigation in this sector is essential. This study aims to assess the greenhouse gas in the livestock sector. The results are reported in methane emissions (CH(4)) and nitrous oxide (N(2)O) from enteric fermentation, and N(2)O by manure management based on the information from the Emission Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR), in all cases expressed as dioxide of carbon (CO(2eq)). The emissions obtained from the EDGAR database for 2015 were proportional to the values of the National Inventory of Greenhouse Gases published by the Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology, and Environmental Studies (IDEAM) in 2016. Colombia is the 12th on global, 4th in America and 2nd in South America position by livestock GHG emission, and is the dominant source in all economic sector. The results showed higher records for CH(4) emissions during the years 2010 and 2015, while the N(2)O emissions were higher during 2015. The regions with the highest emissions of CH(4) and N(2)O corresponded to the northwestern area of Colombia. The Spearman correlation test showed a positive correlation between the CH(4) emissions, and the age groups studied. The post hoc analysis of the Kruskal–Wallis test showed a more significant influence on CH(4) emissions.