Every type of food is unsustainable now

Thelonious Monk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120501615#Comment_120501615

Others say we're losing 1000s of KMs of hedgerows a year

https://www.farmersjournal.ie/minister-told-3-000km-of-hedgerow-removed-annually-749456

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120501675#Comment_120501675

But to people like paddy sure they see nothing wrong with that.

That’s a shocking amount of Habitat to be losing every year. Ecological Armageddon

paddysdream

Anything done here was before you needed planning permission to do so and yea I see nothing wrong with it .

Nowadays you need prior permission to remove a hedge and have to resow same no. of m elsewhere on the farm so stuff removed is done with planning.

Does the article count hedges removed for housing or by councils ?

Cluedo Monopoly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120493568#Comment_120493568

What I don't like about many modern dairy farms is that they 'farm to the wall'. They make sure every inch of the field is grass and grass only. No hedgerows or trees. It looks terrible and is extremely bad for biodiversity.

Jack98

Organic farming is not the answer for an ever growing population worldwide.

The market for organic produce is basically a niche market at the moment still and niche markets in every other walk of life carry a premium but farmers are not converting to organic because the margin simply isn’t there.

By going down the route of fully organic which the leafy suburb greens who are sheltered from the realities of farming all we are going to see is farmers incomes diminished and less food produced. Then by simple economics the results will be clearer less supply, more expensive food which means feed the wealthy while the poor get further and further away from being able to afford to feed themselves. People will really know what a cost of living crisis is then.

There has to be a happy medium struck somewhere and the work farmers are already doing to produce food in a sustainable way needs to be communicated more clearly to the general public as currently the sentiment towards farmers is constant vilification while other industries appear to get off Scott free for their pollution.

lalababa

The blueprint for farming has been outlined in government policy. Almost exclusively in response to reducing emmisions targets signed up to through the EU. By hook or by crook , by carrot and by stick this blueprint will be pursued. The EU agricultural planners don't envisage a decline in farm incomes overall, but there may be reductions in high farm incomes and increases in low farm incomes.

The blueprint is as follows: (for Ireland)

Small and Gradual :

Shift from grass to forestry. (Generous subsidises)

Shift from grass to grains (Subsidies)

Gradual phasing out of chemical fertiliser. (Subsidies)

Gradual decrease in bovines. (Subsidies)

Gradual Shift towards extensification and away from monocrop. (Subsidies)

Gradual Shift towards organics (subsidies)

Gradual Shift towards rewilding and rewetting (Subsidies)

Gradual Shift towards chemical ban. (Subsidies)

Jack98

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502756#Comment_120502756

So by hook or by crook farmers will accept lower farm incomes and what are we to expect farmers to continue on working as they always have.

That is farcical and sadly is the road we are heading down, we are looking at a mass exodus of farmers over the next 20 years anyway due to age profile and it is impossible to see how any of the younger generation will take up the mantle.

Food security may become an issue or alternatively as you pointed out we may shift to feeding the population with the grains we currently use to feed livestock but I find it very hard to see the majority of the population completely changing their diet to accommodate.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502756#Comment_120502756

And those policys will have absolutely devastating unintended consequence’s.

Humans only manage 3 thing’s,

we manage humans

we manage economies

& we manage our environment

Would it be fair to say that we are failing miserably in most of those thing’s?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502803#Comment_120502803

This.

The average age of farmer’s is something like 60 year’s old. Tough gig to be at for that age.

Farming definitely need’s a change because it’s been stuck in the same way of thinking for decade’s & expecting different result’s.

But it’s virtually impossible to buy one in this country.

kneemos

Pointless reducing grass,demand will just be met somewhere else.

Padre_Pio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502803#Comment_120502803

I don't know about that. A lot of people are buying non-dairy milk substitutes (despite the Irish Dairy Council's ad campaign) and if there was a decent alternative to meat then I think people would move to it. Casual vegetarianism is very much on the rise.

Small changes will take time. If people were weaned off the notion of eating meat three times a day then we'd be onto something.

At the end of the day, the only argument for beef farming is A: It tastes good and consumers want it, and B: it's traditional. If A goes away then so does a lot of beef farming in this country.

Thelonious Monk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120502565#Comment_120502565

Farming got off the most scott free in the climate act actually, responsible for most emissions but have to reduce the least

Jack98

At the end of the day we are but a drop in the ocean and we can roar and shout all we want about new initiatives to be Trail Blazers in climate action but until the big hitters in China, Russia etc come to the table and action make some kind of commitments we are at a hiding to nothing.

And of course before I’m corrected in saying that’s the wrong attitude, that is just the truth of it if we want to turn the tide everyone has to buy in globally which I’m afraid until it’s far too late won’t happen.

Padre_Pio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504030#Comment_120504030

Every journey starts with one step.

No point saying "I'm too small to matter, so I'll do what I like".

Jack98

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504037#Comment_120504037

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504037#Comment_120504037

Thanks for correcting me in what I said I would be ahah.

But can people genuinely not admit until everyone agrees on a way forward that the 1/4 of the world that chooses not to buy in with us will continue to more than likely maintain the level irreparable damage being done yearly.

Padre_Pio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504072#Comment_120504072

China is pretty much a world leader in renewables in every category, wind, solar, hydro, both as a manufacturer and a producer.

They're looking at a net-zero by 2060, and I'd have more faith in them achieving that goal than any western country.

People are too quick to point the finger and say "well why should we do it, if they're not doing it". There's no harm in taking the first step, and as an extremely wealthy economy, we should be leading the way.

Per capita, Ireland emits more greenhouse gas than China and about 4 times more than India.

Greyfox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504329#Comment_120504329

We are a wealthy country with more important things to worry about.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504329#Comment_120504329

https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-per-capita/

China is only marginally behind us and is still increasing

Per Capita it's at 7.4 tonne and climbing we are at 8.4 and dropping. I think there is nearly 1.5 billion of the f@@kers as well so they are about 250 times the problem we are.

The EU as a whole is heading for below 6 tonnes of carbon per Capita. Again China is 3.3 times more of a problem

As an aside speaking about hedgerows we get so credit for there carbon value per land area they are probably equivalent to 200k ish HA of forestry.

Similar to the way our cattle herd is treated it's carbon rating is the same as feedlots produced beef and milk. As well the fact that the vast majority of water used in Ireland is from surface collection ( lakes and rivers) as opposed to well based system in most other countries which impacts water tables.

Padre_Pio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504641#Comment_120504641

I think your link is out of date. Nothing for the past few years.

Saying China is 250 times worse because of the population is a nonsense argument. I could make the same argument to show that Britain is ten times worse than us, so why do anything unless the Brits get their act together?

Thelonious Monk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504730#Comment_120504730

remember we are part of the EU who have shared climate goals, 500 million of some of the world's heaviest polluters

Ubbquittious

The members of the 50 cent party love to shout about "per capita" but the world itself does not care about how many people are living on the patch of ground the emissions came from.

China has a pile of coal seam fires the CCP simply can't be arsed throwing the resources at to quench.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504730#Comment_120504730

I think you will find my links are correct. China's greenhouse gases are expanding,they are still commissioning new coal stations faster than ever. It permitted more last year than it ever did. The equivalent to two per week. The rise is in the demand for air conditioning

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/02/1160441919/china-is-building-six-times-more-new-coal-plants-than-other-countries-report-fin

China is now the largest carbon polluter in the world and is the second largest polluter per capita of the major economic blocks.

Basically if climate change is a large barrell of water threatening to overflow. On one side you have the EU trying to take take water out with a cup while China and the US are bucketing it on by the gallon.

I will repeat again China is a larger polluter than the eu per Capita

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120504794#Comment_120504794

The EU greenhouse gasses are declining and lower per Capita than China. As well China's green house gasses are increasing. I think they have committed to start reducing by 2028 at the earliest

elperello

We might take into consideration that China is the workshop of the Western world.

We are quite literally farming out our emissions when we import their industrial output.

Ye are all missing the point. Even if all these country’s went 100 % green energy its still not gonna stop desertification.

Soil turning to desert doesnt take in carbon & it realises it into the atmosphere.

This is the most urgent thing to address.

It can be done very cheaply, provide food, jobs, resources to the most problematic region’s In the world using livestock.

We have no other tools in the garage to achieve this.

For some context on the point im trying to make.

Everything in this area circled poorly in red is land turning or is desert.

That's a couple billion acres.

That land can only support people using livestock.

If we run livestock on that land and start growing grasslands again, the grassland will be able to take carbon out of the atmosphere and store it in the soil for a long as we want it.

Notice in those areas is some of the most problematic region's in the world. War, famine, droughts, fires, poverty animals in the verge of extinction etc

This is northern Americas

Billions of acres of desert or land turning to desert.

Almost no animal's on the land.

Australia, almost an entire continent of dead eroding soil.

What can we do in Ireland?

I think we have thousands of acres in this country that is being poorly managed and not anywhere near as productive as it can be.