Submission to the Climate Change Commission, JS
Our next CCC submission is from Jane and Blair Smith. The submission was very long so here is an abridged version.
Please share far and wide as I am sure you will agree that this submission is right on the money and needs to be heard by everyone!INTRODUCTION: We are sheep and beef farmers and intergenerational environmentalists, farming 1,400 hectares in North Otago. We are strong believers that all farmers are proud guardians of natural resources, essential members of the economy, and play a key role in diverse provincial communities. We breed Angus cattle and Perendale Sheep genetics for other farmers throughout New Zealand and Australia. Our focus is on efficient, sustainable production of red meat and the continued protection of our natural environment.
We were the recipients of the Gordon Stephenson trophy as the 2012 winners of the New Zealand Farm Environment Awards. Jane is a member of the Global Farmer Roundtable representing New Zealand, Lincoln University Sir Ron Trotter Gold medal recipient and a New Zealand Young Rural Achiever.
Given our scientific and economic experience - it is impossible to reconcile the stance that the Climate Change Commission has taken for current Agricultural Emissions reduction targets, especially so for methane. These current targets lack both scientific and fiscal rationale.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: We call a halt to setting any ruminant methane reduction targets until all recent science and a matrix of modelling the impact of decreasing New Zealand’s ruminant livestock numbers and pastoral diversity is undertaken.
Climate Change Commission Agricultural Emissions reduction targets for ruminant methane are ill-informed, untenable and incognisant of science and reason.
10% by 2030 and 24-47% by 2050 reduction targets will have serious implications for the future of our environment, economy and living standards (especially our lower socio-economic sectors).
Low-impact food production in New Zealand will be substituted for more intensive farming both here and offshore, at a tangible cost to all facets of our environment.
We suggest that methane emission reduction targets of 24 to 47% were set not because methane emissions need to reduce in order to “stop” global warming (as methane is having a barely measurable impact on global warming, if any) but to actually offset generic CO2 emissions.
It is not equitable to require farmers to do more than CO2 emitters, in fact it will have dire consequences for each and every New Zealander in our standard of living. The Climate Change Commission needs to move away from the narrow ‘emissions reductions at all cost’ view and actually take a 3-dimensional assessment of their proposed target trajectory (the wider environment, the socio-economic impact and the future of pastoral food production).
If the Climate Change Commission do take a stance that naturally cycling methane needs to be reduced, this sets a reckless precedent for all other forms of methane emissions around the world – including subsistence-farmed ruminants in developing countries, wetlands and rice paddy fields (responsible for circa 21% and 20% of global methane emissions respectively).
A knee-jerk reaction in order to gain global headlines is disrespectful to both past and future generations, detrimental to building a resilient New Zealand, and directly opposed to the vision behind the Paris Accord.
SECTION 1 – ISSUES TO CONSIDER
1(a) Absence of Scientific rationale to decrease ruminant methane emissions: Professor David Frame and other scientists have modelled the warming contribution of New Zealand ruminants to be 4 millionths of a degree C per year or less. This figure is both inconsequential and insignificant.
New Zealand farms 1% of the world’s ruminants. If we include all of the other 99% of the worlds ruminant emissions it equals 0.00396 degrees C warming per year. If the rest of the worlds ruminants also lowered their emissions to the same maximum target of New Zealand that equates to 0.0019 degrees C warming per year. Figures that are so trivial that they are virtually impossible to measure. However, the substantial negative consequences of the destruction of our livestock sector in New Zealand are easier to model both in size and ferocity.
1 (b) Absence of Economic rationale to decrease ruminant methane emissions: New Zealand currently produces enough food for 40 million people - 10 times our population. There is little wonder that our emissions per capita are at a higher percentage driven by food production than those countries that simply import the majority of their food requirements yet have substantial fossil fuel emissions. Should we continue on blindly to meet current unsubstantiated Climate Change Commission targets, New Zealand will in effect be decreasing it's food supply capabilities by at least 24 million global consumers, hence breaking Article 2 of the Paris Accord.
Punitive methane reduction targets may gain headlines and UN accolades initially, but at the same time have disastrous inter-generational consequences on the living standards of both urban and rural New Zealand, economic resilience and mental health.
Unsubstantiated emissions targets create a seismic downwards shift in the economy. Whilst this will have an enormous impact on businesses in all sectors of the economy, it will have an even heightened effect on those citizens most at risk - low income earners (with the cost modelled at circa $8,000 per household/year through heightened food and fuel costs coupled with lower levels of crown support - due to the $800 Million NZD less tax collected every time our GDP decreases by 1%).
It is important to note that if New Zealand were to play an important role in reducing worldwide emissions, we would in fact be asking our primary producers to increase our agricultural production, given that we are the most efficient primary producers in the world when water and resource use/kg product and carbon emissions/kg product are analysed.
Hence, by restricting New Zealand’s agricultural exports, this Government will be responsible for significantly increasing global emissions as far-less efficient food producers step up production to fill the gap. This is an incredibly short-sighted policy that will decrease global food production, cripple our currently robust primary sector, rural and urban communities and future.
1 (c) Absence of acknowledgement of serious unintended consequences in the Climate Change Commission current target range:
Destruction of Rural Communities Regulatory impacts show that economic growth could slow by $5-12 billion per year between 2020 to 2050 – a loss of around $300 billion. Farming outputs have been modelled to drop by 50 percent from current levels by 2050 – which is both ironic and unpalatable, given that this is the same timeframe that the primary sector was asked to double it's productive capability.
To put this into context, this is a 1 million stock units per year decrease in the sheep and beef sector. Any rabid environmentalist that assumed that this would see a decrease in dairy cow numbers has identified the wrong target. This decrease will be in the sheep, beef and deer sector – ie the farm types that international tourists specifically come here to see – including our high country farmers and our organic and regen producers.
To put this into further context, that is effectively shutting down one provincial town every year between now and 2050. Our small town of Oamaru processes 1 million stock units per year through our biggest employers whom are our two meat processing plants. If these companies were to shut down (as we have modelled the current Climate Change Commission targets would eventually lead to) then our entire town shuts down – including one of our three high schools, at least 6 primary schools and our entire local tourism sector.
Depreciation of the value of our current low-input pure protein advantage:
Vaccines, Boluses, GE/GMO designed to allegedly reduce methane emissions in livestock risk interfering with natural biological systems and potentially destroying our natural pastoral-raised protein status. While vaccination for unwanted diseases is common practice, an additional vaccination that has no benefits to the animal and that interferes with natural rumen processes may face consumer, regulatory and animal welfare pushback, risking our high Quality-Assurance, pasture raised status for little more than a headline saying we are “doing our bit”.
Risking our production efficiency trajectory that we have worked so hard to gain over the past 30- 40 years:
An example of this is the circa $50 million of taxpayer and farmer money that is currently being wasted in selecting sheep and cattle for supposed ‘low methane’ genetic traits. From a production and a genetic point of view this is irresponsible and ill-informed at best – selecting livestock on a political trait will mean through the theory of genetic selection substitution that other productive traits (such as growth efficiency) and animal welfare traits (such as parasitic resilience, conformation and survival) will be put at risk through selection of this non-productive trait.
There is concern that selection for supposed ‘low methane’ emitters on pastoral land will result in breeding sheep and cattle with smaller rumens that require a high-quality feed all year round. The reality is this is not possible in a real-life hill country low-intensity pastoral system, will lead to poor animal welfare outcomes and will lend itself to a factory feedlot type of farming system. Is this the way in which New Zealand farming wants to be viewed by the world? Why would we give away our pastoral free-range, low-input, innovative and efficient genetic advantage to turn to intensive factory farmed animals just to tick one very narrow quasi-heroic box to say we are “doing our bit”.
Cessation of practical, tangible environmental initiatives by farmers:
On a farm level, even though we have a large mortgage and a high-cost burden due to inflation in our expenses, as a humble family-owned farm, we still try and set aside circa $10,000- $20,000 per annum for environmental initiatives every year (such as the 180,000 trees we have planted including native riparian areas). Let us be clear. If we are forced to decrease our already sustainable methane production further (through taxes or stock reduction, both of which are effectively the same thing) then we will be forced to cease ALL other environment initiatives – including the time that we spend on our local catchment group projects, hosting schools and all of our native tree planting.
The adverse consequences of the proposed legislation are already starting to be felt, with thousands of hectares of productive farm land already being purchased by businesses to plant pine trees for carbon credits to offset their carbon footprints. Most are unlikely to have any intention of harvesting the pines. The effect will be to lock-up once productive land and extinguish economic benefits to the economy.
With forestry employing 1.5 people per 1,000ha of plantation, compared with farming at 7.6 workers per 1,000ha of pasture, this change in land use will decimate farming communities and service towns including meat processing plants. 75 percent of forestry companies operating in New Zealand are foreign owned. That is likely to increase under the Government’s new changes, hence any returns from these supposed investments will be directly funnelled offshore.
If the Climate Change Commission understood and acknowledged robust science and modelling around climate change and the science of methane, then no methane reductions would be in place at all.