February 1, 2021

Australian beef producer makes first global carbon credit sale

In what is believed to be the first global carbon credit sale made by an Australian beef producer, New South Wales beef Wilmot Cattle Co has struck a deal with Microsoft to sell about half a million dollars worth (~US$380,000) of carbon credits as the latter targets to meet its carbon neutral goals, Guardian News reported.

The credits represent an excess of 40,000 tonnes of sequestered soil carbon, which the livestock operation has been able to achieve through advanced grazing management.

The specific details of the deal are confidential but Wilmot said the monetary value was on par with the current contract price of Australian Carbon Credit Units.

For the past ten years, time-controlled rotational grazing, increased stocking density and decreased paddock size have improved ground cover, biomass and water-holding capacity on more than 4,000 hectares of Wilmot New England country.

According to Wilmot, while its focus has been raising productivity and profitability, overgrazing has not happened in drought years, resulting in soil organic carbon concentration rising from 2.5 to 4.5%. Their goal is to reach 6% by 2023.

The Wilmot carbon credits have been verified and sold by United States company Regen Network, which has branded them CarbonPlus Grassland Credits. Regen works to allow land stewards globally sell their ecosystem services to buyers like Microsoft.

Alasdair MacLeod, chairman of the Macdoch Group, which owns Wilmot Cattle Company, told Beef Central that its team is working with the Clean Energy Regulator, an independent statutory authority, to help develop the regulated market for soil carbon credits in Australia and hopes that soil carbon projects will become widely available to Australian farmers in the near future.