Efficiency and Emissions Performance in Latvian Dairy Farming: An LCA-Based Comparison Across Farm Sizes

The European Union’s (EU’s) climate neutrality agenda prioritises sustainable agriculture, within the scope of which the dairy sector is central to food security, rural life, and trade competitiveness. While Latvia’s contribution to milk production in the EU is comparatively small, dairy farming constitutes a structurally important sector in the country that must reconcile economic sustainability with environmental concerns, including greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and resource use. Therefore, this study’s research aim is to identify key environmental hotspots and explore the relationship between productivity, economic performance, and sustainability using the life cycle assessment (LCA) approach in farms of different sizes in Latvia. This study applies an LCA methodology to evaluate environmental hotspots and investigate the relationships between the productivity, size, and economic performance of Latvian dairy farms; in addition, the GHG emissions of Latvian dairy farms are analysed. Small farms dominate by number in Latvia, while the largest farms have the highest yields and milk quality, and are more economically sensitive due to their high production costs. The LCA results show that large farms have the highest absolute environmental impacts—particularly milking and feed production—though the emission intensity per kilogram of milk is lower than that in small farms. These findings indicate productivity–profit trade-offs when considering environmental impacts, with milking and feed emerging as the key areas for enhancing sustainability.