Guy Trafford finds there is something-for-everyone in the UN and IPCC documentation, enabling policy makers and those affected to talk past each other and still claim they are respecting these agreements

A commonly quoted defense of our livestock systems is/was an outcome from the Paris Climate Talks Agreement (2015) I.e. that GHG emission reductions should not come at the expense of food production as per Article 2. This can easily be argued as a correct interpretation as the two below segments extracted from the UNFCCC site state:

Recognizing the fundamental priority of safeguarding food security and ending hunger, and the particular vulnerabilities of food production systems to the adverse impacts of climate change, (p1)

(b) Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change and foster climate resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions development, in a manner that does not threaten food production; and ... (p3)

The document these quotes comes from, at 27 pages, appears to be a relatively summarised summary but a useful go-to resource.

Despite this, livestock agriculture in New Zealand in particular has received a lot of negative publicity and pressure to down-size. Much of this comes from groups who are committed to seeing animals removed from the food cycle for reasons other than climate change, but climate change fits their argument, so it is an opportunity not to be missed.

Perhaps, not surprisingly, given the amount of documentation that comes out of the UNFCCC and associated bodies it could be argued that all attitudes and arguments can find some sort of supporting statement, a little like groups can find supporting statements in the Old and/or New Testaments to support positions.

So, when a more detailed search is done the later published (Climate Change and Land. An IPCC Special Report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems[2019] ) and far more comprehensive document is read (all 906 pages) then a different view may be extracted.

The difference between the two documents is that it was the Paris Climate Talks Agreement that the New Zealand government signed up to, not the latter. However, this shouldn’t be used as a reason to not recognise that within the latter there is plenty of relevant points raised that may and probably are influencing at least some (and likely our government's) actions and responses.

One poignant point that they raise is the ‘law of unintended consequences’ which can result from perverse outcomes when things done for one reason, often a ‘right’ reason, can end up with not achieving the result desired. New Zealand agriculture has a long and continuing history of trying to achieve better production and efficiency. This is largely to gain better economic returns by lowering inputs for a given output. DairyNZ in particular highlights the fact that New Zealand has one of if not the lowest cost of emissions for a given product output and Beef and LambNZ are not far behind in this view. At face value this is a credible result to be aimed for, however as the IPCC document points out;

Increases in economies of scale linked to increased efficiencies and decreased emission intensities may lead to more emissions, rather than less, an observed dynamic referred to by economists as a ‘rebound effect’. This is because increased efficiency allows production processes to be performed using fewer resources and often at lower cost. This in turn influences consumer behaviour and product use, increasing demand and leading to increased production. In this way, the expected gains from new technologies that increase the efficiency of resource use may be reduced (for example, increase in the total production of livestock despite increased efficiency of production due to increased demand for meat sold at lower prices). Thus, in order for the livestock sector to provide a contribution to GHG mitigation, reduction in emissions intensities need to be accompanied by appropriate governance and incentive mechanisms to avoid rebound effects, such as limits on total production.

One of the comments posted on Keith Woodford’s article alluded to this earlier this week , stating; “It all seems such a ridiculously futile exercise to me, when the solution to both water and atmospheric pollution is to apply a carrying capacity approach by limiting un-natural inputs to land.  Farm/produce within the limits that the ecosystem of your property allows.” For most farmers the direct limitation approach would go down like the proverbial lead balloon, however, many analysts already are agreeing that the high price of dairy products is largely due to the fall in supply coming out of the northern hemisphere, so a win, win is potentially possible.

In addition, the argument that New Zealand farmers are providing the world a service in supplying the world in valuable food supplies is a disingenuous argument. If that was our driving motivation we would be farming much of our flat/suitable land in arable crops. More food per hectare and at lower inputs of costs and water (on irrigable land) and less of an environmental toll. There is still a place for livestock production but let us not defend it with using a supposed moral high ground, when it is profitability driving it.

Let’s face it, we all are in agriculture to primarily make a living, in a lifestyle we enjoy, working with the systems we enjoy most (some of my best friends are sheep). But it needs to be clarified that:

Article 2 of the Agreement makes clear the agreement is within ‘the context of sustainable development’ and states actions should be ‘in a manner that does not threaten food production’ to ensure food security.

It doesn’t state that things shouldn’t change. The Agreement was also made within the context that global warming would be kept under the +1.5% increase in temperature. It is now looking increasingly likely that this is going to be exceeded. Does this change our expectations of what should be done?

On a converse argument, the report mentions;

Price increases in turn lead to reduced consumption, especially by vulnerable groups, or to shifts towards cheaper food, which are often less nutritious. This leads to significant increases in the number of malnourished people.

On the positive side the report while strongly denounces deforestation, it does not advocate converting productive food producing land in forestry. For interests’ sake a ‘model’ of the report authors’ thinking is shown below. It does not show anything that has not been discussed at some point, but show points of intervention that may help in GHG emissions.

Source: Climate Change and Land.

The purpose of this article is not the decry our livestock system and try to replace them with arable or other ‘higher producing’ systems but to highlight the issue of putting up the argument of “safeguarding food security” by itself as a reason for continuing what we do will increasingly come under pressure and using the argument of “there are no workable solutions” may not cut it in the future.

Or market forces for higher producing land uses may create change by itself.