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A necessary reduction in climate impact and raised interest in the self-sufficiency of food in Sweden serve as the major background for the study. The purpose was to examine whether conversion of Swedish agriculture following principles of Ecological Recycling Agriculture (ERA) could be a realistic alternative. Case studies of 22 ERA farms were performed, and results were presented for five production groups in kg production, carbon sequestration, and nutrient balance per hectare. The farms show climate impact substantially lower than Swedish average agriculture, through 85% lower commodity purchases and 2.3 times larger carbon sequestration due to more ley cropping. Target diets with varying amounts of meat and dairy products were defined and matched with the production and presented in scenarios where the farms’ staple food production is upscaled for a Swedish population of 11 million inhabitants. Results are presented in kg of food category produced, hectares of arable land, CO2 equivalents, and kg of N surplus per capita. The scenario results show that it is possible to achieve at least a 90% decrease in climate impact. It is concluded that it is within range for Sweden to be self-sufficient in staple foods based on the available acreage of arable land by adopting Ecological Recycling Agricultural principles in a similar manner as the studied farms.

HELCOM (Helsinki Commission) has adopted a programme with a vision of a healthy Baltic Sea Environment, with diverse biological components functioning in balance, resulting in good environmental status and supporting a wide range of sustainable human economic activities. HELCOM assessments presented in the Stakeholder Conference plan of 2007 clearly show that problems with eutrophication exist in most of the sub-basins of the Baltic and that good environmental status has not been achieved. Agriculture is responsible for a large share of the leaching of nutrients to watercourses, including groundwater lakes and finally the sea. The analysis of data presented in this paper concludes that specialized agriculture with its separation of crop and animal production results in a high load of nitrogen and phosphorus to the Baltic Sea. This agricultural specialization took place throughout the Scandinavian countries after World War II and has resulted in farms with a high density of animals and great surpl...

Agriculture is the single most important contributor to the eutrophication of the Baltic Sea. Itis responsible for 59% of the anthropogenic nitrogen and 56% of the phosphorous emissions(HELCOM, 2005). A second important source of nutrient emissions is at the other end of thefood system – emissions from municipal waste-water treatment plants and from privatehouseholds. Addressing different aspects of the food system is thus crucial for the Baltic Seaenvironment. To tackle eutrophication both nitrogen and phosphorous loads should bereduced (MVB, 2005). This can be achieved if emissions from the food system are reduced,e.g. by closing the nutrient cycle from soil to crop and back to agricultural soil (Diaz andRosenberg, 2008). Granstedt (2000) finds that the high surplus and emissions of nitrate andphosphorous in Swedish agriculture is a consequence of specialized agriculture with itsseparation of crop and animal production. Similar findings are reported from different partsof Europe (Brower et al., 1995). About 80% of cropland in Sweden is used for fodderproduction but the animal production is concentrated to a limited number of specializedanimal farms. Manure, with its contents of nutrients from the whole agriculture area, istoday concentrated on only 20% of the Swedish arable land (Statistics Sweden, 2011). Thisresults in high nutrient surplus and load of nitrogen and phosphorus from these areas.Granstedt (2000) concludes that the emissions can be limited by combining best availableagricultural technology with increased recycling of nutrients within the agricultural systemtrough integration of crop and animal production - ecological recycling agriculture (ERA).This facilitates an efficient use of the plant nutrients in farm yard manure. Other studies ofnutrient balances comparing farming systems and lifecycle assessment report similarobservations (Halberg, 1999; Myrbeck, 1999; Steinshamn et al., 2004; Uusitalo, 2007). Thepotential of reduced nutrient emissions trough ERA was confirmed in case studies on localorganic farms around the Baltic Sea (Granstedt et al., 2008; Larsson and Granstedt, 2010).Carlsson-Kanyama (1999) found that greenhouse gas emissions could be reduced by localand organic food production due to shorter transportation. Similar results are reported in acompilation of studies (FiBL, 2006) and in studies of local production and processing inJärna, Sweden (Wallgren, 2008). According to Carlsson-Kanyama et al. (2004) the reductionsare not significant unless local distribution becomes more efficient. QC 20160524