Could Brexit halt the progress of Irish agriculture? It could, but it doesn’t matter, because climate action is going to do that anyway.
“Any increase in biogenic methane emissions from continually increasing livestock numbers will put the achievement of this target in doubt,” said the Government last week, as it set out its Ag Climatise plan for a climate-neutral agriculture by 2050, starting with a 20% reduction in nitrogen fertiliser use by 2030. With 350,000 hectares of organic farming by 2030 also in the plan (compared to 74,000 ha now); an effective cap on livestock numbers; and a one-fifth cut in the nitrogen fertilisation which powers our grass-fed enterprises, the days of expanding agricultural production are over.
It’s only a “roadmap”, but much of it is likely to be cut and pasted into the national CAP Strategic Plan which the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine is preparing for the next Common Agricultural Policy, scheduled to start in 2023.
EU Agriculture Commissioner Janusz Wojciechowski kept the pressure on last week with a reminder to member states that they have much to do in their Strategic Plans, on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, noting that disparities can reach almost five times the EU average in some places, and all member states must ameliorate this situation.
In a tweet, he noted that the average agricultural GHG emission in member states is 2.5 tonnes/ha, but 10.3t in the Netherlands, and 7.4t in Belgium. Next on his naughty list are Malta at 5.7t, Luxembourg at 5.3t, and Ireland at 4.4t. Comments on the tweet noted that emissions per unit of output such as per kg of milk might be more appropriate. Nevertheless, the DAFM, always eager to toe the EU line, will have climate action as a high priority in the plan they submit in order to qualify for Ireland's share of the CAP billions.
That means farmers can expect it to include roadmap measures to control the number of animals and management of their manure, while offsetting methane emissions by carbon sequestration and storage.
Expect the DAFM to seek CAP help also on reducing the nitrogen fertiliser used on Irish farms from 408,000 tons in 2018 to 325,000 in 2030, with an interim target of 350,000 tonnes in 2025. Much of the remaining nitrogen fertiliser will have to be in a form coated with urease inhibitor.
“Over 50% of chemical nitrogen usage is in the dairy sector and therefore this must be a key focus area,” is an ominous warning in the roadmap document that there will be no free ride for milk production, the only expanding farm sector.
Presumably, CAP funding will be sought by the DAFM to encourage farmers using online nutrient management planning, a national liming programme for mineral soils to further improve nitrogen use efficiency, and use of non-chemical nutrients such as bio-based fertilisers and soil conditioners.
It’s all in the roadmap, along with low emissions slurry spreading increasing to 60% in 2022; 80% by 2025; and 90% by 2027.
The roadmap envisages all external slurry stores should be covered before 2028, to reduce ammonia losses.
Maybe CAP help can be sought for the roadmap objective of incorporation and maintenance of clover (and mixed species) in all grass reseeds by 2022.
The roadmap — and by inference, Ireland’s CAP strategic plan — includes re-wetting carbon-rich soils to convert them from carbon sources to sinks, and rewarding farmers for the carbon benefits their farms provide.
Some roadmap actions are scheduled to start next year, such as genotyping all calves in herds whose owners opt to stay in the Beef Data and Genomics (BDGP) programme in 2021. An end to stock bulls for breeding replacements in dairy herds is envisaged by 2025.
Hopefully, the DAFM will also seek CAP aid for the roadmap objectives of increasing dairy herds in milk recording from the current level of 50% to 90%, and beef weight recording in suckler beef herds from the current 30% to 70%. Younger slaughter and first calving ages are also targeted in dairy and beef herds.
Recording of grass production on all farms above 100 livestock units or 130 kg of organic N per ha is required in the Ag Climatise roadmap.
Better animal health strategies to support climate and environmental ambitions include completion of BVD eradication by 2023, significantly reducing bovine TB, increasing participation in the Irish Johne’s Control Programme, and a new programme to reduce IBR. Also targeted are somatic cell count, dairy herds lameness, and breeding programmes for disease resistance.
However, such attempts are unlikely to recover lost production due to reduced use of nitrogen fertiliser.
Nor can farmers turn to extra feeding; instead they must reduce the protein content of livestock feedstuffs, to minimise ammonia loss
Pig feeds must be 16% or under, beef and dairy feeds 15% or under.
Efforts will be made to develop and use new feed additives to reduce biogenic methane from ruminants.
Where will Irish farmers see their place in this roadmap, when the ambition is not to expand but to farm in a way that minimises emissions? That is unlikely to attract the next generation of farmers, unless they are organic farmers.
Organic farmers have been burned by previous Government schemes, with 75% of applicants rejected when the organic farm scheme re-opened temporarily in 2018. But, with double-digit growth in the EU’s organic food market, they will soon have their chance to expand, with a more generous scheme to encourage them, if the government is serious about the roadmap target to increase organic farming more than fourfold by 2030.
With conventional farmers being challenged to reduce nitrogen fertiliser 20%, and a generous organic incentive scheme likely, many will say to themselves, “Why not go the whole hog, and try organic?”
It will seem a much better bet than forestry, even though very generous forestry incentives will be likely also, in a bid to achieve roadmap targets of 8,000 ha per year of afforestation, and 125 km of new forest roads per year.
But licence applications logjams and objections by the public have now soured the few farmers who might have been willing to try forestry.
The roadmap’s on-farm carbon trading to reward farmers for public goods will incentivise farmers to retain and protect items such as hedgerows. But an EU regulatory system for carbon farming is a long way away.
The roadmap makes much of a “sustainable circular bioeconomy within the agri-food sector”. Farmers won’t get excited about that, it’s what they have been doing for centuries, using livestock manures for fertiliser and never wasting crop residues, either fed or ploughed in to increase soil organic matter.
Already paying for the fourth most expensive electricity in the EU, they also don’t need the roadmap's advice to use energy more efficiently. As for “becoming more self-sufficient in terms of renewable energy production”, many have given up hope that Ireland might incentivise this at farm level, which other member states started doing 30 years ago .
