Farming makes progress on emissions reductions

Last month, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) confirmed that agricultural emissions reduced by 4.6 per cent in 2023. That reduction marks three years in a row where reductions have been achieved in the agriculture sector. The single biggest contributor towards these reduced emissions figures from farming was a reduction in fertiliser use. The huge price increases in fertiliser prices in recent years have resulted in farmers cutting back on this input. Some productivity compensation from reduced nutrient inputs has been achieved by the ongoing introduction of clover-rich and multi-species swards. Lower use of chemical nitrogen (N) overall has been accompanied by increasing use of protected urea, a more efficient N source, allowing farmers to partly offset the productivity losses from lower fertiliser application. Other novel technologies have also contributed, including low emission slurry spreading (LESS), which has increased the efficiency and efficacy of slurry use.
Ultimately, a balance must be struck between reducing inputs and maintaining productivity, unless the industry decides that lower productivity is an acceptable and inevitable outcome from the regulatory requirement to cut emissions in agriculture. This debate is yet to be had and needs to consider economic and social sustainability in addition to the environmental element.
The reductions achieved in lowering emissions, most notably through reduced fertiliser use, cannot be looked at in isolation. There is little definitive evidence to date that fertiliser reductions are improving water quality in terms of N levels in surface or groundwaters. The latest EPA analyses of water quality standards around the country show no overall water quality improvements up to the end of last year. This may or may not reflect a natural time lag between cause and effect. Farmers are attempting to maintain livestock numbers by leasing more land. This reduces overall farm stocking rate but, in many cases, does little to reduce stocking pressures on milking platforms.
Further reductions in fertiliser use will result in lower livestock numbers and decreased productivity. If that is the case, then we will have lost significant economic sustainability with negligible, if any, gains in environmental sustainability. Irish emissions reductions may make an infinitesimally small contribution towards mitigating the impacts of global climate change, but will have been bought at a very high price for our farm sector. 

There remains the valid argument of food production displacement in Ireland resulting in carbon leakage to less carbon-efficient food-production regions. Dismissal of carbon leakage by some observers does not invalidate it as a factual outcome. Without an unlikely fundamental change in eating and dietary habits, it is reasonable to assume that consumers across the world will purchase food from wherever they can source it, without discriminating on its relative impact on the global environment. That is the case now, and reductions in food production in carbon-efficient countries such as Ireland, would only make that consumer decision even more likely in the future, as choice of provenance reduces.
It would be far better to allow time and space for scientific advances to deliver the innovative tools necessary to further improve the low carbon footprint food production systems prevalent on Irish farms. Our ag-tech focus in this edition of Irish Farmers Monthly highlights some of the impressive advances already made, with the potential for even more greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions suppression and reduction technologies in the pipeline, both in Ireland and across the world. We must embrace these developments and protect our ability to produce environmentally, socially and economically sustainable food for an increasing global population.