The United Nations has identified forest conservation as an important component in the battle to bring carbon emissions down. Contrary to the perceptions of many, livestock farmers are convinced they can contribute too. And they have the figures to prove it. 

On publishing its 2024 Emissions Gap Report in late October, the United Nations (UN) said “climate crunch time” had arrived. The UN has been publishing this report annually since 2016. Its aim is to track the gap between where global emissions are heading and where they ought to be if humanity is to limit global warming in line with the Paris Agreement. The agreement, also from 2016, binds its 195 signatories to work to keep the rise in the global surface temperature to “well below” 2°C, compared to pre-industrial levels. Signatories also agreed to pursue the objective of keeping global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.

When the 2024 report appeared, it showed that there was a new record for global greenhouse gas emissions in 2023 with a total of 57.1 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent (CO₂e). The reaction of UN secretary-general, António Guterres, was to say: “We are teetering on a planetary tightrope. Either leaders bridge the emissions gap or we plunge headlong into climate disaster, with the poorest and most vulnerable suffering the most.” He said governments urgently had to show “a surge in ambition” to achieve emissions reductions that are substantial enough to put the Paris targets back on track.

For 1.5 or “well below 2” degrees Celsius to become achievable again, the UN said nations, collectively, must commit to cutting annual greenhouse gas emissions by 42% by 2030 and by 57% by 2035. Without these “dramatic cuts”, the report warns, the world could face “an inevitable and catastrophic” temperature rise of 3.1°C by the end of this century.

Sources of hope

In spite of the tone of its headline message, the UN said in its presentation of these figures that there is still hope. Boosting solar photovoltaic and wind energy usage could contribute 27% of the required reduction for 2030, and 38% of the reduction needed by 2035. Forest conservation could provide an additional 20% of the necessary reductions in both years. Other effective strategies the UN suggests include enhancing energy efficiency, electrifying “various sectors” and transitioning from fossil fuels in buildings, transport and industry. To make any of this happen, though, there will need to be “unprecedented international cooperation”.

These suggested measures focus on energy because, according to the UN’s figures, energy contributed 68.7% of total emissions in 2023. It attributed a further 4% to waste, and just over 9% to industrial processes. Land-use, land-use change and forestry have a share of 7%. It attributes the remaining 11% of emissions to agriculture, with livestock’s share standing at 6% of the total.

Part of the solution

It is clear from what it has said that the UN believes management of forests can become part of the solution. What if livestock farming can do the same? Unrelenting messages that push people to reduce or reject the consumption of animal protein as a way of combatting climate change are common. They form no part of the 2024 Emissions Gap Report, but they have become commonplace in mainstream media’s coverage of this question and are an important part of the content in press releases and reports from campaign groups. A few weeks before the new UN report appeared, Greenpeace Nordics published its own 82-page climate-change update using ‘Pulling the climate emergency brake on big meat and dairy’ as the subtitle. In the days that followed, the organisation celebrated the fact that the document’s appearance had led to “activists from many countries [paying] a visit to some of the world’s biggest meat and dairy giants”.

Professor John Gilliland would not class himself among the “meat giants”, but he is a livestock farmer. His family has run Brook Hall Estate in County Derry in Ireland since 1856. He is a member of the European Union’s Soil Mission Board, a special advisor to the UK’s Agriculture Horticulture Development Board, and honorary professor of practice in agriculture and sustainability at Queen’s University Belfast. But the herd on his farm is small, comprising 20 dairy-cross-beef steers. Nevertheless, he, too, has been on the end of questions about this part of his work from members of the public. At ‘open farm’ events, he says “impressionable young people” have been forthright in their criticism of him for being part of the livestock industry.

His answer is to acknowledge their passion for sustainability, but then to put a question back to them. He explains: “I ask them how much carbon they have responsibility for managing every year. They admit they have no idea. I thank them for their honesty, but then I tell them that they should know their numbers. I know my numbers. On my farm I am responsible for managing 24,405 tonnes of carbon every year, and that’s before I produce an ounce of food for them to eat. And, for this, I ask them to treat me with some respect because they need me as much as I need them. That disarms the aggression and the passion, and then we can have a good conversation.”

What the numbers say

Where he seeks to take that conversation is to the positive contribution to the fight against climate change that farmers can make. John Gilliland believes that if forest conservation can be a force for good in reducing emissions, livestock farms can be, too. He believes, from knowing his numbers, that Brook Hall Estate is already making a positive impact because the figures tell him that the farm is not only at net-zero, but has gone beyond net-zero.

The farm worked out its numbers by using Agrecalc, an agricultural resource efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions calculator developed in Scotland, and by working with PhD students from the Netherlands and Ireland. It worked out its greenhouse gas emissions and calculated the amount of carbon in the farm’s soil and in its trees and hedges to be able to estimate carbon sequestration. This gave Professor Gilliland a figure for the farm’s net carbon position. Gross emissions work out at 151 tonnes of CO₂e per year. Gross sequestration is 156 tonnes of CO₂e per year. Net emissions from Brook Hall Estate are, therefore, minus-4  tonnes of CO₂e per year. Tools the farm has used include airborne LiDAR (light detection and ranging) technology to determine the height of the trees on the site, and soil-sampling technology to measure carbon content at depths of up to one metre below the ground and to chart changes in carbon levels.

Super soil

Establishing the height of the trees and the canopy area they cover makes it possible, using software, to work out how much carbon the trees hold. Soil analysis at Professor Gilliland’s farm has allowed him to work out which type of land-use delivers the most carbon sequestration. Converted to CO₂e, the soil on the farm captures just under 20,000 tonnes. He thinks it is interesting that, even though he has a large number of trees, including short-rotation willow trees as a renewable energy crop and oak trees that are 250 years old, 80% of the carbon the farm captures is in the soil. He thinks this calculation might come as a surprise to some of the groups that call for farmers to get rid of livestock and plant more trees. Cattle faeces plays a hugely important role in soil health. He has figures to prove this. His land-use is diverse, but he now knows that the areas where his livestock graze are the areas with by far the best concentration of earth-worms and of bacteria and fungi biomass in the soil.

He encourages all livestock farmers to work out their own numbers if they can, acknowledging that it will be much harder for some to do so than for others. He calls for help from regulators and from governments to recognise and register the positive contributions that smaller-scale farmers are making to wider efforts to combat emissions. These could scale up to agricultural enterprises of a bigger size, but he questions whether or not scope-three emissions systems or government greenhouse gas emission inventories are “smart enough” to pick up the changes that farmers like him are achieving already. 

Health from the ground up

There are win-wins through which farmers can help accelerate the move to net-zero while remaining viable businesses. But there are also win-lose scenarios and he points out that farmers cannot deliver net-zero without help in making sure the win-wins happen. These include improving the use of genetics in managing herds, reducing the age of slaughter and improving soil pH. Win-lose alternatives include, in the professor’s opinion, the much vaunted option of feed additives as a means of reducing methane from cattle herds. “This is supposed to be a big silver bullet,” he says. “Everyone is telling me that. But who is going to pay? There is a second big push in Europe for green nitrogen fertiliser. These are things we could do, but at the moment they would mean losing money. That’s why farmers are in no rush to do them.”

All of this, of course, is about helping farmers find viable ways of continuing to produce food while achieving and going beyond net-zero. Professor Gilliland’s soil statistics show how important livestock are in this. He says he believes in health from the ground up and that healthy soil makes for healthy societies. Making livestock farms more efficient and more sustainable can help feed people and make the Paris Agreement more achievable.

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