December 8, 2020

Farms in Wales encouraged to further cut down greenhouse gas emissions

A new report has urged farmers in Wales to do more in cutting greenhouse gas emissions despite being among the world's most sustainable.

The report by Meat Promotion Wales and researchers from Bangor University and the University of Limerick carried out detailed analysis of 20 sheep and beef farms, including researching how much carbon they stored through grassland and trees.

Agriculture accounts for around 12% of Wales' emissions - much of it is methane coming from livestock. According to the report, beef cattle at the farms studied were responsible for a net 11-16kg of CO2 equivalent emissions per kilo on average, compared with a global average of around 37kg of CO2 equivalent emissions per kilo.

Government advisers at the Climate Change Committee (CCC) have warned agriculture is a challenging area for Wales, given the importance of farming to rural communities. Hence, they recommended achieving a 95% cut in emissions by 2050, a less ambitious goal than for the rest of the United Kingdom.

Even then, the report recognised the importance of "maintaining a critical mass of livestock production" to "ensure the economic and cultural sustainability of Wales." For its part, CCC advised that a fifth of UK farmland should be dedicated to efforts to store carbon.

In the coming weeks, the first draft of a proposed new Welsh Agriculture Bill is set to be unveiled, with rewarding efforts to fight climate change central to new subsidy arrangements for farmers in future.

- BBC