2024/06/06 by Bellet, Vincent, Rouger, Soizick, Desmaison, Philippe +8
#Agriculture biologique #Animal welfare #Bien-être animal #Coût de production #Meat quality #Organic farming #Production costs #Production seasonality #Qualité de la viande #Saisonnalité de la production #Sheep farming #Élevage ovin viande
paper · doi:10.17180/ciag-2024-vol94-art17
The CASDAR project "RéVABio" (2020-2023) aims to improve the marketing rate of lambs under the organic label. It focused in particular on reducing the "leakage" of organic lambs to the conventional sector due to the mismatch between production and demand peaks. To find solutions, the slaughterers under survey were open to complementarities between basins, but the producers’ organizations focus first on staggering production locally. On the farms monitored or surveyed, the carry-over of lambs seems more acceptable than changing lambing periods, as it generates fewer additional costs, but also less work, a better fit with the meaning of the job, etc. On a national scale, simulations have modelled the combination of systems allowing the best match between supply and demand, but they have pinpointed an antagonism between this objective and the overall farm sustainability. Two experiments testing the carry-over of uncastrated pasture-fed male lambs over 10 months of age did not reveal more unpleasant meat quality attributes than for controls reared indoors. A third experiment showed that the ‘pasture signature’ was visible in the meat as early as 3 weeks on pasture.