Climate Change: Farmers urged to plant forests

The country’s farmers are being urged to go green and plant forestry to avoid Ireland being slapped with billions of euros in fines for the carbon footprint from our millions of burping cows.

Ireland is one of the few countries on the planet where cows outnumber people, which accounts for surprisingly high greenhouse gas emissions.

RTÉ’s Ear to the Ground programme has revealed how agriculture now accounts for over one third of greenhouse gases emissions.

Ireland has committed to reducing, by 2020, greenhouse gases like methane and carbon dioxide by 20%, and 40% by 2030, at the same time as the country is gearing up to expand dairy and beef production.

To offset the carbon produced by our cows, farmers are being encouraged to plant forests which act as the planet’s lungs that absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow.

In tonight’s show, climate expert Joseph Curtin, from the Institute of International and European Affairs, said it was very hard to increase dairy and beef production without ramping up our carbon footprint, and without costing billions in fines.

A member of the Government’s new advisory council on climate, he said planting forestry on loss-making beef farms would help to offset the carbon footprint.

“We have loss-making beef farms where we can look at forestry as a a potential solution,” said Mr Curtin. “This would give us a double carbon dividend.

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“If you take a beef farm which isn’t a profitable going entity, there is very attractive forestation programmes.

“You would be sucking carbon into the atmosphere on one hand and reducing emissions from beef on the other hand.

“We need to get our incentive system right so we are incentivising things that are good for farm income and good for the environment.”

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Kim McCall said his farm captures more carbon than his 70 beef cows and 80 ewes emit through his growing forests on his old-style farm which uses very little bought-in foodstuffs or fertiliser. The Kildare farmer, who has won environmental farmer of the year seven times, believes farmers should be rewarded for keeping their carbon emissions down. “Farms like this and I’m sure there are hundreds like it are actually carbon sinks. We’re actually providing a service to the country and we’re not getting rewarded because we’re locking up carbon.”

Ear to the Ground, tonight, RTÉ One, 8.30pm