Improved productivity could reduce on-farm greenhouse gas emissions from sheep by up to 12%, according to the author of a study which calculated the carbon footprint of sheep. Stewart Ledgard, a principal AgResearch scientist, said a higher lambing percentage and faster lamb growth rates offered the best options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from sheep, as opposed to reducing fossil fuel use, which was low on sheep farms compared with other intensive agricultural systems.

Dr Ledgard said the 1.9kg of CO2-equivalent produced for each 100g portion of lamb exported to Europe, was “broadly consistent with other international studies of products derived from farmed, ruminant livestock reports The ODT. His study found 57% of the sheep carbon footprint was generated by the natural process of animals utilising pasture and producing methane during digestion, but it was a figure that has been decreasing.

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AgResearch will soon seek regulatory approval for field trials of new transgenic grasses it claims could reduce greenhouse gas emissions. AgResearch’s applied biotechnologies manager, Jimmy Suttie, said the transgenic grasses had both environmental and productivity advantages reports The ODT. The grasses were high in energy, which meant fewer animals were needed to get the same production, reducing the amount of methane released.

The science behind the forage meant digestion of the plant was more efficient, cutting the amount of methane produced by animals and increasing energy that went into tissue and productivity. But Dr Suttie said the technology also had implications for further research to cut methane emissions and reduce the volume of water required by the plants.

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A British Government report hidden from the public for almost a year exposes the food miles argument for what it is – a fallacy. Despite being published last year, the research commissioned by Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) has only recently seen the light of day reorts Rural News. Defra has not said why it delayed making the paper public, but the politically inconvenient nature of the findings are evident. An earlier scoping report submitted to Defra notes that ‘various lobby groups might make use of the results to support their causes’.

But the final paper bluntly concludes that the millions of Britains who think they’re doing right by the environment in choosing locally grown food over imports have been duped. ‘It seems certain that unless the UK embarks on a radical change of lifestyle, from drastically reducing the consumption of livestock products to embracing veganism, and moving to a more seasonal diet, food will need to be imported from overseas to meet the demand. ‘Since a substantial volume of imports appears to be inevitable it may be better, when considering the [environmental impact] of food production, to accept that imports from countries where productivity is greater… will lead to less total global warming potential than preference for local produce.’

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Over the next few months we’ll know what sort of emissions trading scheme we’ll end up with. Judging by the review process so far by parliament and government, it will be light and easy. If it is, it will fail reports Business Day. It will discourage emitters from investing in new and better technology, leaving taxpayers to pick up the tab for buying international credits to cover our ever-growing greenhouse gas liabilities. The impact will be far greater than simply a taxpayer subsidy of inefficient industry. We will have no credibility in December’s Copenhagen negotiations on a post-2012 climate change treaty. Crucially, we won’t help drive the agenda on agricultural emissions, which account for half our profile, in the same lead-by-example way we have long done with agricultural trade.

The concept is simple: those agricultural emissions are, in large part, a waste of nutrients. Current farming practices spill carbon and nitrogen into air, soil and water. But better breeding and management of ruminant animals and their feed, combined with recycling of those nutrients on-farm, would increase the output, reduce the costs and improve the environment. Producing a litre of milk generates greenhouse gases equivalent to 940g of carbon dioxide, Fonterra has determined in its recently released carbon life-cycle analysis. Around 85% of the gases are emitted on farm, 10% downstream in manufacturing and 5% in distribution of the finished products.

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At last some promising information on tackling our livestock emission issues. Attempts to cut greenhouse gas emissions from NZ livestock are in line to aid the nation’s obligations under the Kyoto Protocol agreement. Dicyandiamide, commonly known as DCD, is being used to prevent the conversion of nitrogen in cow urine and dung to the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide reports The NZ Herald. The gas is thought to make up about one-sixth of the country’s total greenhouse gas emissions. Tests show that DCD may cut up to 70% of nitrous oxide produced in this manner.

After years of research, the Government hopes the DCD effects will be factored in to NZ’s official emissions count when it is tallied by the UN in 2015. Mark Aspin, manager of farming research body the Pastoral Greenhouse Gas Consortium, said there was “pretty sound” evidence to show DCD significantly cuts emissions by keeping nitrate in the top layer of soil, where grass roots could absorb it before it washed away or transformed to nitrous oxide. “We’ve done this all based on sound science so there’s no real reason why it won’t be acceptable [to the UN].”

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