Trees, the natural way to store carbon
As the COP21 negotiations trundle on, Ireland wants an exception for our agriculture sector.
The main excuse given is that if we don’t produce meat and dairy products, other countries, with higher greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in their meat and dairy production, will instead.
There are a number of flaws with this argument.
First up, we are the carbon leakage.
The 2010 EU commission publication, called GGELS, from which our top rank for GHG emissions and dairy stems, also exposes that we’re fifth best for beef.
This means that the four above us could produce more GHG efficient meat were it not for us.
For sheepmeat, incredibly, we’re only 10th best in the EU.
This means that nine other countries could be producing more GHG efficient sheepmeat, were it not for us.
So arguing that if we don’t do it someone less GHG efficient will, is simply factually wrong when it comes to beef and sheepmeat.
Somehow, we’ve allowed a good dairy GHG score at EU level to morph into the illusion of best in the world across all sectors.
There are other issues too. The ‘others might do it instead’ argument imagines trade deals with places like Brazil, where, very expressly, Brazil is left out of all current trade deals being negotiated.
TTIP, TPP and CETA (Pacific, US-EU and EU Canada deals respectively) exclude all the BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia India and China.
This current raft of trade agreements, and indeed the Russia trade war, could be seen as a way to inhibit growth in the BRIC countries.
We are also presuming growth in meat and dairy consumption will continue forever, despite their high GHG emissions compared to other foods.
This is like presuming coal will still be burned, despite the existence, and needs for, renewables.
Yes there are growth predictions for both coal and meat/dairy, but if these growth trajectories do happen, we are facing runaway climate change. All of us.
In this context, is it more ethical, and sensible, to ‘say let’s try something different, and let’s try to convince others to eat that food’?
Or will we continue presuming people will ignore the evidence as the planet fries?
So just like leaving fossil fuels in the ground seems impossible but yet also the only sensible thing to do, based on the science, changing land use away from land grabbing and methane producing conventional livestock production, and over towards other types of production makes eminent sense.
These other systems would integrate livestock more into mixed farms with proper rotations and clover for N fertility.
They would also be much more about producing vegetables from mixed cropping systems.
And the range of soil regenerative practices currently possible and carried out on model organic farms would have to be mainstreamed.
Agroforestry holds the most potential for farmers, especially sheep farmers, to keep farming and store more carbon.
As we saw in this supplement last week, while the livestock stocking rate stays more or less the same, there can be 400 to 1,000 trees per hectare with agroforestry.
The tree itself is a store of carbon, while soil carbon levels soil structure are improved with standard agroforestry techniques.
With organic fertility and pest management techniques, along with agroforestry, soil microbiology would be strengthened, restoring and regenerating the soil.
Research has shown that soil carbon can increase by 2.2% per year in organic farms, but remain at best stable on conventional farms.
Also organic matter levels are 7% higher in certified organic soils.
We are the Carbon Leakage. But we don’t have to be.
