Beef cattle can have a wide range of positive and negative impacts on the environment. Some of these impacts are general to ruminants, whilst other are specific to cattle, and, because of the type of management systems and habitats that they graze, there are some impacts which are specific to beef cattle. Impacts are often classified in terms of their potential to provide benefits and damage to the atmosphere, water, soil and vegetation. This classification will be issued below to explore the most important ways that cattle, and their land use, influence the environment and the extent to which scientists can increase understanding to influence these impacts.