Taking place on 28 August 2025 in the Innsbruck Congress Centre, Session 76 will bring together researchers and stakeholders working across livestock sustainability, animal welfare, environmental assessment and food system transformation. The session will highlight recent scientific developments and innovative approaches for assessing the environmental, economic and social dimensions of livestock production systems.

The joint session reflects the strong collaboration between the four Horizon Europe projects, which share a common ambition to support the transition towards more sustainable and resilient livestock systems.

Through a series of oral presentations and posters, participants will explore how value chain assessments can help better understand livestock production systems, identify sustainability trade-offs and support evidence-based decision making across the food chain.

The oral session will cover a broad range of topics linked to sustainability assessment, circularity, environmental performance and animal welfare.

Presentations will examine the role of territorial indicators and ecosystem carrying capacity in redefining livestock’s contribution to food systems, as well as new approaches for evaluating sustainability constructs and structural factors in European livestock systems.

Additional contributions will address socioeconomic sustainability assessment methods, economic resilience in broiler production, and the relationship between livestock intensification and feed-food competition across European farming systems.

Environmental assessment will feature prominently, with presentations focusing on life cycle assessment (LCA) methodologies, environmental footprints of animal-sourced foods, biodiversity monitoring approaches and the integration of ecosystem services into milk quality assessments.

Animal welfare and production performance will also be discussed through studies examining heat stress mitigation in dairy goats, welfare indicators in growing-finishing pigs, poultry meat quality, and the influence of housing conditions on livestock outcomes.

Alongside the oral presentations, the poster session will provide further opportunities for scientific exchange and discussion.

Featured posters will explore the effects of stocking density on pig welfare, growth performance and meat quality, as well as the relationship between welfare improvements and meat quality in broiler chickens.

Other contributions will investigate methodologies for assessing manure impacts within livestock life cycle assessments, participatory approaches for sustainable livestock production, and the role of detailed herd modelling in identifying synergies within the European food system.

Together, the posters will complement the oral programme by showcasing innovative methodologies and practical applications addressing key sustainability challenges in livestock production.

Session 76 will provide an important platform for dialogue among researchers, advisors, industry representatives and policy stakeholders interested in the future of sustainable livestock systems. By bringing together expertise from multiple projects and disciplines, the session aims to foster knowledge exchange and encourage the development of integrated assessment approaches that support more sustainable livestock value chains.

INTAQT looks forward to welcoming participants to this joint session and contributing to discussions on how science can support the livestock sector’s transition towards greater sustainability, resilience and societal value.