We are told we must prepare the industry and ourselves for a low carbon world.  A quick look back at the preindustrial low carbon era highlights food shortages, food insecurities and war being amongst the leading causes of death.  Renewables are not the answer, they are creating more problems than they can ever hope to fix.  Even a limited amount of reading history books or yarning with an old timer would have you conclude the only good thing about the good old days is they are gone.

Fiat paper money is not the real currency of planet earth, Carbon is the true currency of the world.  Organic carbon dictates the health of the environment, stored hydrocarbons provide energy for the maintenance of civilisation and carbon is the basis of all life on earth, without carbon there would be no economies, no environment, and no life.  Accounting for the cyclical nature of carbon in a grazing operation is insanity.  How can an animal which is part of an environment cause emissions?  It can only cycle natural gasses.  Blaming Carbon Dioxide for climate change and ignoring the hydrological cycle is just as crazy.

Sustainability drivers are coming at us from all angles; from customers, politicians, supply chains, financial institutions, from producers ourselves and from extremist enviro-vandals.  Unless we get on the front foot and direct the conversation Australian Agriculture will go from being a point of difference to a point of confusion in the marketplace.  If we leave the conversation up to the extremist, we will cop more of the insulting political talk saying Australian farmers are resilient, adaptive and efficient.  In other words they are planning to make our industry unviable with impossible red and green tape.

Some peak industry bodies are continuing with the Carbon Neutral by 2030 (CN30) agenda, even though it has shown to be impossible to achieve and will result in catastrophic financial losses for our industry.  We are all facing the future together for the first time, the information our industry had at hand to commit to the CN30 target is negligeable compared to the information we have at hand today.  The CN30 decision was made with the best of intentions and with the best available knowledge of the day.  It is said only the very powerful and very stupid do not change their position when facts come to light which contradict their beliefs.

One of the greatest things in being involved in the rural industry is the people; decent, honest country folk who want to live an honourable and productive life.  Inviting the slick carbon salespeople into the industry is as dangerous as introducing a new predator into a farm ecosystem.   Our simple environment is stable and is at risk of being overrun by commercially sophisticated shysters, by the time we wise up to their predatory behavior it is mostly too late – as many of those who have signed up for so-called ‘renewables’ are finding out.

To borrow a saying from MLA’s Integrity Systems: ‘Integrity Matters’. It is one of the foundation stones of our industry and what is most highly valued by our customers.  Are we prepared to continue with the CN30 now we have information at hand telling us it is not achievable?  I am sure our customers would much rather the truth from us and a new undertaking to become climate neutral.  Climate Neutral is a much better story to tell as we can include biodiversity, water quality, carbon sequestration, regenerative practices, healthier food, humane animal husbandry and more stable climate.  Australia emits some 1.1 percent of the global carbon, agriculture emits 10pc of Australia’s carbon, our industry must reduce our emissions by 40pc to achieve CN30.  Are the peak bodies prepared to ruin our industries reputation and financial viability to make 0.044pc difference to the world atmospheric carbon levels?

 Our consumers want the truth and our farmers want to tell the truth.

George King has contributed this article in his personal capacity as a cattle producer from NSW. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities they represent.