The Influencers: Rod Carr

Emissions pricing ahead

The Climate Change Commission has recommended that a basic farm-level emissions pricing system be introduced as soon as it is possible.

This would help to lay foundations, which could then be rapidly developed into a more responsive and effective policy. The best approach to pricing agricultural emissions would be a detailed farm-level pricing system outside the NZ ETS.

This system would be best able to recognise and reward the good choices farmers make to reduce their gross emissions in line with the statutory targets. Even though government and the sector won’t be ready for a detailed farm-level system by 1 January 2025, pricing agricultural emissions must not be delayed.

Any set back will make it more difficult for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its emissions reduction targets and increase the likely cost of meeting our Nationally

Determined Contribution to global efforts to address climate change.

Our analysis shows that eligible farmers can be ready to effectively participate in a basic farm-level system by the 1 January 2025 deadline that Parliament has set for pricing agricultural emissions.

The time for action is now – we can’t afford to wait for the perfect policy.

A lot of hard work has been put in – by farmers, the He Waka Eke Noa partnership, and by the agriculture sector more broadly – to make progress towards meeting the primary sector climate change commitments, and getting ready for emissions pricing,

The progress that has been made is enough to keep the sector on track for a basic farm-level pricing system by 1 January 2025.