Livestock Complete the Nutrient Cycle

Tim Hammerich

News Reporter

Animal agriculture can play a vital role in a circular and sustainable economy. But locating livestock close to city centers is difficult to do. In The Netherlands, Peter van Wingerden has build a floating dairy farm to locate it close to the city center. It captures residual streams to use as feed for the cows.

Van Wingerden… “Bread from the Turkish bakery, orange peels, grass from the football stadium over here, grass from the golf courses, rest products from the food bank. So all these products that comes to us, we measure the protein, the vitamins, the fiber, the fat percentages. We mix it, and then it goes to the cows.”

Rather than being transported to a landfill, these items are upcycled by the cows into milk and other nutritious dairy products.

Van Wingerden… “(The dairy) is a three layer building. So on top, the 40 cows run. They produce milk and manure. One layer down, we process the milk into consumer products like pasteurized milk, like yogurt, like buttermilk. We are also processing cheese and that ripens below the water level. And the milk and all the products we produce ourselves goes back to the city. And we upgrade the manure to organic fertilizer. And that goes also back to the city, like the dairy. So our footprint is almost zero over here on a sustainability.”

Van Wingerden hopes to add a floating greenhouse in the near future.