“Slash herd and flock numbers” says AGO

Dynamite Greenhouse Report Delayed For Election?

“Slash herd and flock numbers” says AGO

“What?” says The National Party.

The Australian Greenhouse Office is delaying the release of a report that recommends Australian graziers slash flock and herd numbers to reduce methane emissions.

“While we haven’t seen the document – which was due out a month ago and is apparently ‘delayed at the printer’ – we know the position of the scientists leading the methane team,” says Climate Change Coalition candidate for Parkes, Michael Kiely. “The document will say, first and foremost, we must run fewer animals.” (See Dr Richard Eckland reference below)

“Let’s hear what the National Party has got to say about that.”

“I’d like to know if the economics of these recommendations been analysed.” (See reference below)

The IPCC (the International Panel on Climate Change) has re-configured agriculture’s contribution to global warming to include its ‘transport footprint’. This is a departure from the Kyoto Protocol principles and will have the effect in Australia of enabling extremists to claim that agriculture emits more GHG than the stationery energy industry.

“This policy is insane. It could destroy the regenerative agriculture movement and lead to a decline of native grasslands. It would certainly increase soil degradation and desertification,” says Mr Kiely. “The only way to meet the Methane threat and retain stock numbers lies in SOIL CARBON volumes. This can offset the new high levels of CH4 and retain animal impact.”

Many techniques for capturing and storing soil carbon will be on show at the world’s first Carbon Farming Expo & Conference will be held in Mudgee on 16th-17th November, 2007 – a week before the election.

Scientists have found that native perennial pastures, properly managed, can sequester as much carbon per hectare as plantation forests and native vegetation.

Australia’s sustainable farmers are getting the most rapid C increases using combinations of grazing management, pasture cropping and biological farming. “But the dominant paradigm - that Australian soils are too old and depleted to retain soil C (though no credible data supports this conclusion) -- remains the official position,” says Mr Kiely.

And the madness piles on madness: reducing herds will cause LESS carbon to be stored in the soil!

“The Climate Change Coalition seeks to rally the grazing management community to challenge the "stock is bad, de-stock is good” argument. We recommend Council of Crisis involving HM, RCS, the CMAs and prominent practitioners to educate the AGO in the immense potential of agricultural sequestration. Good grazing management should be central to its BEST PRACTICE regime.

“I am standing in the seat of Parkes for the Climate Change Coalition to alert the electorate to the threats to regenerative agriculture and the soil carbon opportunity to radically transform rural landscapes.”








REFERENCES
http://www.greenhouse.unimelb.edu.au/

http://www.greenhouse.unimelb.edu.au/BMPsSummary.pdf

GIA Summary May 2006 1
Reducing uncertainty and best management practices for minimising
greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture
A summary of the research currently being conducted by the Greenhouse in Agriculture
program, under the CRC for Greenhouse Accounting.
(Adapted from a paper by Dr Richard Eckard, Program Manager Greenhouse in Agriculture.
CRC for Greenhouse Accounting, The University of Melbourne and Victorian Dept Primary
Industries. Presented at ABARE National OUTLOOK Conference 2006.)

Animal numbers
An obvious management practice would be to run fewer animals, but to manage each animal to be more productive. By improving genetic and nutritional management, production can be maintained from a smaller herd. Associated with producing more per head on pasture -based systems is an increase in the emission/head, but this is more than compensated for by less animals. ….

• Animal stocking rate - The higher the stocking rate the higher the volume of
nitrogen deposited in dung and urine per unit area. Dung and especially urine are
very inefficiently recycled in the soil plant system, with up to 60% of the nitrogen in a
urine patch being lost to the environment. Higher stocking rate systems demand a
higher nitrogen input regime (either fertiliser or imported feed) and thus result in a
higher nitrogen content excreted in urine. A urine patch from dairy cow commonly
contains between 800 and 1400 kg N/ha effective application rate with the patch. A
higher stocking rate also leads to greater pugging (hoof compaction) of the soil;
pugged soils tend to be more anaerobic due to hoof compaction leading to higher
nitrous oxide losses.

…….


These options will all need to be economically assessed prior to being
communicated to the agricultural community to ensure a positive driver for adoption.
The adoption of greenhouse specific management practice is not likely to be a high priority for the farming community, and there are currently no policy drivers or market incentives for adoption of these practices. Researchers and policy makers would therefore be unwise to publish greenhouse -specific best management practice manuals, but should rather aim to seamlessly integrate greenhouse best practice into existing industry adoption pathways and mechanisms. This also ensures that these greenhouse best management practices are consistent with other industry best management practices, thus improving the adoption and the opportunity for a win-win outcome; this is the approach taken by the Greenhouse in Agriculture program team.