Four potential options have emerged for the agriculture sector and how it might be treated when an emissions trading scheme starts in Australia in 18 months time.
Farm leaders from nearly every agricultural industry met in Canberra on Monday with Federal Minister for Climate Change, Penny Wong, and her agricultural counterpart, Tony Burke, at a special rural roundtable where the complexities of trying to fit the farm sector into the scheme were obvious.
A consultation group made up of some of the farm leaders at that meeting is being established and will feed recommendations on how to include, or not include, agriculture in the scheme which is being designed at the moment in time for its start in 2010.
Farmers at the meeting say the ministers appeared to acknowledge just how difficult emissions trading is going to be for the farm sector because of:
• Its emissions.
• Different abatement options.
• The sheer number of farms which would need to be individually measured.
Agricultural emissions from livestock and cropping inputs in particular are hard to measure, while abatement opportunities in soil sequestration are equally difficult and not currently recognised under the Kyoto protocol.
But agriculture will have significant cost increases to contend with regardless of whether it is in the scheme or not, because abatement costs in areas like freight, energy, chemical, fuel and fertiliser will all have to be passed through the supply chain.
At the ABARE Outlook conference in Canberra earlier this year it was revealed farm productivity would need to increase by as much as 60pc in a generation to respond to the impact of climate change and related mitigation policies.
This was based on forecast values for carbon under an emissions trading scheme up to 2030 and considered the impact on farmers either outside that scheme or inside the scheme and counting the cost of emissions.
Recent figures indicate 30pc of the inputs in broadacre farming are energy or energy-dependent, with their costs expected to rise markedly under the scheme.
NSW Farmers Association senior vice president and climate change spokesman, Richard Clark, attended the meeting and said four options for agriculture were now apparent.
• The first is, agriculture could be included in an emissions trading scheme the same way as power stations, adhering to a cap, measuring emissions, being issued permits for emissions and using carbon abatement options.
• The second is that the sector not be covered by a scheme, but still be allowed to generate credits through abatement processes like planting trees, reduced land clearing, or if the science is right through soil sequestration.
This would help agriculture mitigate some of the costs of a scheme existing in Australia.
• The third option is for agriculture not to be covered by the scheme and not be allowed to generate credits, although this is not a favoured option because there is no chance to offset carbon trading costs forced onto the sector, nor incentive for agriculture to reduce its emissions.
• The fourth option would again to be outside the carbon trading scheme, but would impose regulatory restrictions on agriculture to achieve carbon reductions, which would cost the government more money than the scheme would and lack flexibility to improve environmental practices at a farm level.
Mr Clark said while the sector was working hard to prepare itself for the scheme, the science is still out on agricultural emissions, and this may prevent it from being ready by 2010.
National Farmers Federation president, David Crombie, said a lot of work now needs to be done to ensure agriculture is not severely impacted by a scheme, but he points out that the timeframe is extremely tight.
Mr Crombie said there was no clear option that stood out at the round table, but there is a clear understanding that agricultural emissions are very complex.
AgForce Queensland president, Peter Kenny, said there is strong recognition by the new Government that agriculture is part of the solution to climate change and emissions reduction.
Senator Wong said the consultation work with the farm group would play an important role in the Government’s Green Paper on emissions trading, to be released in July, while Mr Burke said he would continue to ensure agriculture had a place at the table for the emissions trading scheme discussions.
Organisations represented at the meeting included the National Farmers Federation, NSW Farmers Association, Queensland Farmers Federation, South Australian Farmers Federation, Victorian Farmers Federation, AgForce Queensland, Pastoralists and Graziers Association of Western Australia, the Northern Territory Cattlemen’s Association, Grains Council, Australian Dairy Farmers, Australian Cane Growers Council, Cattle Council of Australia, Meat and Livestock Australia and the Australian Farm Institute.
SOURCE: Rural Press Naitonal News Service, Parliament House Bureau, Canberra.
Email a friend
Favourites
Del.icio.us
Facebook
Digg
StumbleUpon
MySpace
Reddit
Newsvine
LinkedIn
Kwoff
Twitter