Former Greens leader offers dairying tips

AUCKLAND: Dairy farmers could increase their profits and reduce their methane emissions by 20% at the same time, right now, Green Party activist and former leader Jeanette Fitzsimons says.

All it would take, she told the parliamentary select committee hearing submissions in Auckland yesterday on the Zero Carbon Bill, was reducing the dairy herd and improving existing feed practices.

In a hardhitting submission, Ms Fitzsimons also warned that urgent reductions in greenhouse gas emissions were ‘‘much more important’’ than setting longterm targets.

Recent research suggested two types of emissions were much more dangerous than previously thought, she said.

One was the danger from methane, the main greenhouse gas emitted by farm animals.

The other was from pine trees, which made up the bulk of the Government’s billion trees programme.

The committee, chaired by National MP and climate change spokesman Scott Simpson, has been meeting in both Auckland and Christchurch since Thursday, and will reconvene in Wellington later in the week.

Ms Fitzsimons, appearing before the committee in a private capacity, criticised the Bill for focusing on targets.

People pinned their hopes on miracle solutions, she suggested.

‘‘A year saved now is worth many more later. Reductions are much more important than how fast we get to zero.’’

Fitzsimons said it was known that methane was ‘‘enormously more powerful’’ than previously thought.

She said there was also a problem with pine plantations, which had been highlighted by climatologist Jim Salinger.

His concern is Pinus radiata absorbs more heat from the sun than most types of vegetation.

In doing so, the trees release compounds into the atmosphere that mop up methanedestroying chemicals.

The good news for farmers was they did not need to hope for some amazing new technology, she said, quoting research done by agricultural economist Peter Fraser, formerly of Treasury, into the ‘‘marginal cow’’.

‘‘Fraser’s work shows that more cows don’t inevitably mean more profit,’’ she said.

‘‘If you feed cows better, and reduce the stock, you should be able to increase your profit and make a difference for the environment.’’

She said veterinarian and ecologist Alison Dewes had studied Waikato dairy farms and found a 20% reduction in stock numbers would lead to better profit.

Another researcher, Barry Ridler, has found the same.

His work suggests ‘‘seriously overstocked farms would be more profitable if they reduced the number of cows by 30%’’.

Fewer cows would mean more grass to go round and less need to import other feed.

The contrary point of view was put to the committee most forcefully by Federated Farmers Auckland division senior policy adviser Richard Gardner, who said his organisation believed an appropriate reduction in methane would be 10% by 2050.

The Bill proposes 24%47% by that date.

He described methane as a ‘‘shortlived gas that contributes almost nothing to global warming’’ and said the most important aspect of the Paris Agreement on climate change was the ‘‘particular fundamental priority of food security’’.

Mr Gardner said the first preference of Federated Farmers was for methane targets to be set by the commission, not by Parliament.

The committee has now finished its sittings in Auckland. Over three days, most submitters urged the MPs to strengthen the Bill. — NZME