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CLIMATE CHANGE IS one of the defining challenges of our times, with broad consensus among citizens that urgent action is needed. There is less consensus, perhaps, on the actions that need to be taken to mitigate climate change.
Unfortunately, however, the debate around climate change mitigation often generates more heat than light. It is an almost universal truth that those with views that are polarised on any issue think that right is on their side. Neither sincerity nor passion are in short supply.
For policymakers, navigating the complexities of a subject like climate change requires an honest and objective assessment of the available science. It also requires an understanding of a much broader range of issues.
Policies for all
Where policies involve significant change affecting real people, then human behaviour and sentiment, economic impacts, including on a micro level, and values and vision, are also a vital part of the complex web of policy consideration.
After all, the purpose of public policy is to improve the lives of our people and make our country a better place to live. That means that responding effectively to the climate emergency must be a shared objective.
The challenge around the impact of agriculture on the environment is a perfect example of an issue where all of these considerations are front and centre. The world needs food and Ireland is the sustainable food capital of the world.
The need for sustainable food production is a priority in international policy instruments from the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to the IPPC Report on Climate Change.
Irish farmers are world-class and make an extraordinary contribution to the Irish economy, to rural communities and to employment. They supply world class food and raw materials to people all over the globe.
That’s not just rhetoric – that is fact.
The €8.2bn in farm gate output, the €14.2bn in agri food exports to over 180 countries, and the 163,000 agri food jobs in rural Ireland, demonstrate all of that. And, uniquely, farmers can provide a range of ecosystem services that can contribute positively to addressing environmental challenges.
Adapting to change
Farmers are dynamic and innovative – they are adapters and adopters. They have embraced new technologies in areas like animal breeding, soil management and the environment and invested in a variety of innovations in machinery and equipment.
I feel there needs to be a greater recognition that, at an international level, Ireland produces food in a way that is leading the world in terms of sustainability.
Since 2015, with assistance from my Department, Irish farmers have invested approximately €92m in Low Emissions Slurry Spreading (LESS) Equipment. They have embraced environmental action, with more than 55,000 farmers participating in programmes and measures that improve water quality, biodiversity and climate efficiency.
Many of our farmers are also members of the quality assurance schemes which underpin Origin Green’s sustainability credentials.
Their work has shaped the landscape in all of its variety, from lowland pastures to woodlands and uplands, which make Ireland an especially beautiful place in which to live, work and visit. Irish livestock reared on grasslands are among the most natural and carbon-efficient in the world.
I am extremely proud of what our farmers contribute to our country.
Nonetheless, climate change, the loss of biodiversity and water quality are among the great challenges of our time, not just in Ireland but globally. The truth is that if these challenges are to be tackled, every country must make a contribution.
Crucially, every sector must also make a contribution – the narrative that somehow agriculture is the sole source of emissions is absolutely wrong and dominates far too much of the conversation.
What the objective analysis of the EPA tells us in successive annual reports, is that while the environment in Ireland is generally good, critical metrics on greenhouse gas emissions, on water quality, on air quality and on biodiversity are heading in the wrong direction.
Agriculture contributed to this but is, as I said, not the sole cause.
One of many contributors
This is not a value judgement on agriculture, nor has Government policy picked agriculture out for singular attention. Other sectors such as transport, industry and the built environment have all been challenged to reduce emissions and improve environmental performance.
It is clear that the next Climate Action Plan will have to be more ambitious if Ireland is to achieve its targets for 2030, and that agriculture, along with every other sector, will make its contribution.
We will of course need to improve our understanding of the sequestration potential of Irish farmland, and that work is underway, but we also need to reduce absolute emissions from agriculture. There is no denying this and it will be challenging.
The truth is that agriculture, like every sector, will have to make significant changes over the next decade and beyond. Farmers are up for that challenge because they are true pioneers in this area. I don’t know of a single farmer who does not want to contribute positively to the environment by reducing emissions, improving water quality and enriching biodiversity on their farms, nor do I know of a single farmer who will be encouraged to do so by a narrative that demonises or patronises.
Farmers need to be confident that they will be supported, financially and in other ways, in their efforts, not just by Government, but also by operators all along the supply chain, and by consumers and citizens.
They need to know that they can make a decent return from their farm enterprise and that their value to society and the economy, which is indisputable, continues to be acknowledged.
The challenge is to ensure that we create a policy and commercial framework that meets these complex objectives, so that Irish farmers can continue to produce world-class food, support economic and social development, care for the landscape and improve the environment in the decades ahead.
Charlie McConalogue is Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine and Fianna Fáil TD for Donegal.
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You can sort out the publicans in a couple of weeks when they want to sell drink, but forestry farmers can’t harvest their crops because you won’t get off your ar5e and sort out the licence backlog.
Timber prices have gone up.by 30% at a time when we have enough standing timber to meet our needs. Instead, we have to import it, at a time when we have a housing shortage. That takes a special kind of incompetence.
If you can’t do the job, just say so, and ask an Taoiseach to appoint somebody who can.
@John Mulligan: I know nothing about this personally. Why is there a backlog?
@Edmund Murphy: 6,000 licences held up. As much as two year’s delay in getting permits to fell. Irish Mills bring in shiploads of logs every week to meet demand.
I’ve seen incompetence over the years in departments, but this situation is about as bad as it gets. And a green junior minister who just wants to hug the trees.
@Edmund Murphy: for some reason the Dept of Ag are really slow in granting forestry felling licenses. There has never been as little new land planted in trees because of it. Farmers are slow to plant new land when they see their neighbours not able to harvest timber.
@Richard Williamson: really slow? The department has just given up, it would appear. Ireland isn’t anywhere meeting targets on planting.
A minister with any ability would introduce a planting license that also included permission to thin and harvest the crop, since these are logical outcomes of planting trees. And he would go into the department and clear the backlog, using whatever legislation is necessary to do that.
They can do it almost overnight for the vintners, but this minister has been in the job for a year and there is zero progress. In my world, that means stepping aside and making room for somebody who is able to do the job.
@Edmund Murphy: Two issues – firstly there is a professional objector turning in objections to every single felling license. Secondly the state forestry company switched from bundling up a few dozen licenses manually a couple of times a week to automated batch felling – meaning they could throw out 2000 applications in a single week. The result is that the dept haven’t sufficient manpower to clear the backlog.
If our government were serious about reducing carbon footprint there is many ways of working with our farming Community to reduce it. Solar panels on the thousands of the farm buildings we have to house the national herd that is being blamed. Anaerobic digesters that produce methane from the waste from the same herd that can be used to generate electricity or feed bio gas direct into the network.
In my opinion they just want the cash from introducing carbon taxes rather that actually dealing with the problem.
@Ed Kelly: Fantastic suggestions. Tailored planning for each farm is whats needed.
Climate Action Plan means the phasing out of beef and lamb by 2030, you forgot to mention.
@Dave Kelly: no, it means doing it in a way that doesn’t destroy our environment, either water, habitats or air.
@Dave Kelly: Honestly reading that it feels like they forgot to mention any detail on anything.
@Dave Kelly: there is a dearth of detail in the reality that farming had to evolve. Globally, meat production needs to decrease for sustainability and water pollution. instead of fawning at keeping everyone funded, see if it would be sustainable to reduce supply and increase costs for beef. I’d have no issue paying €40 a kg instead of €20 of we reduced or herd size in half.
@James Ward: James, please oh please, tell me where you can get 20 euros per kg for beef.
I would suggest offering 30 year greening contracts to farmers where they are payed to use their farms as biodiversity banks and carbon sinks. The payments should be on top of the cap and be planned between the farmer and an environmental advisor. They would take into account historical land productivity so that the farmer is actually financially better off producing these environmental services on part or all of their land than farming intensively. Each farm in the scheme would have a tailored plan for best biodiversity use. With plans and payments revised upwards every 5 years. I would suggest phase one of the scheme cover enough land to cover most of the rest of Irelands productive farming, phase 2 could be expanded to an cross government carbon sale system in the EU.
Ireland is the sustainable food capital of the world? According to whom, exactly?
According to the food sustainability index, we’re not even in the Top 10.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/11/france-is-most-food-sustainable-country-u-s-and-u-k-faltering
@Fifty Shades of Sé: According to the spin constantly put out by IFA and swallowed by cowardly politicans who appease them rather than take definitive action to protect our environment and give farmers a sustainable long-term future.
” Charlie is confident, farmers will embrace climate change” Never heard such bull. They are as bad as the anti Vax crowd. Nothing but self interest Can they not see that their futures are at stake while they count their cap. Not long ago they were talking about supplying the Chinese and Brazilian markets with Beef, from a tiny country. C’mon! What damage is that attitude doing to Ireland. If Charlie and the farmers are serious about this. Do something instead of using meaningless words. Impose it on the farmers, don’t ask them and don’t pay them. If the Greens dont stop concentrating on bicycle lanes instead of this. They will be finished forever. Then again so might we all
Complete lack of joined up thinking is the name of the game. No local CHP competing for bundles of enhanced, cyclically harvested hedgerow and stream over cover. No constructed wetlands on every suitable small stream system, soaking up the phosphates and nitrates, as well as sequestering large amounts of carbon in the spaghnums for later soil enhancing land spreading. These two no brainer moves would give a massive, massive boost to our biodiversity as well as put a regular income into farmers’ pockets.
CHP was tried, but simply handed to the corporates in a beef cartel repeat. Gave as little as possible to the producers and took all the profit. Died on the vine as a result.
Good man I think that you may qualify for the super bol***ks rating. Keep it up!
Im sorry, but i cant much care about an industry that rips terrified calves from their mams, exports livestock in big cargo ships to far flung destinations to be killed for profit and just generally treats all living creatures as commodities. Not to even mention trying to rope their kids into the industry, throwing them up into their dangerous tractors in the front seats on busy roads, and also having them help out on the farm despite it being the most dangerous place a child can be. And also, last but not least, being stuck behind a fleet of tractors during harvest time, none of whom could be bothered pulling into the hard shoulder to let you safely by.
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