Dismay over agriculture exemption from ETS

Email
Print

Dismay over agriculture exemption from ETS

3News NZ

Jan Wright told The Nation she is dismayed by plans for the continued exemption of agriculture from the scheme until at least 2015 and for continued subsidies to big industrial users (file pic)

Jan Wright told The Nation she is dismayed by plans for the continued exemption of agriculture from the scheme until at least 2015 and for continued subsidies to big industrial users (file pic)

By Tony Field

Parliament's Commissioner for the Environment has warned that plans to amend the Emissions Trading Scheme will cost New Zealand dearly in the long-term.

Jan Wright told The Nation she is dismayed by plans for the continued exemption of agriculture from the scheme until at least 2015 and for continued subsidies to big industrial users.

Businesses and farmers were supposed to start paying more for their carbon emissions, but the Government says that can't happen until the economy can afford it – something that's dismayed Ms Wright.

“These latest amendments that are making their way through Parliament now just weaken it to the point of being a skeleton, nothing more than a skeleton, and I find this deeply disappointing,” she says.

Ms Wright says taxpayers will foot the bill if the big carbon emitters are exempted.

“They are only paying for one 20th, one of every 20 tonnes of the carbon emissions they produce. You and I at the pump are paying for one out of every two, for example.”

Federated Farmers says New Zealand's agricultural production is already low carbon compared to many countries, dropping by 1.8 percent every year for the past 20 years.

“If you drive emissions, or production to other economies who are actually producing more per unit, more carbon per unit, then you are doing exactly the wrong thing,” says William Rolleston of Federated Farmers.

Business New Zealand says the issue is how much New Zealand can do relative to other countries.

“I think we underplay what we do,” says John Carnegie of Business New Zealand “I think we are doing, given that there are only two other schemes in the world out of 190-odd countries, we are doing okay.”

But the Greens say we are not doing okay.

“You can be a world leader,” says Green MP Kennedy Graham “You can be a fast follower. You can be an apathetic spectator. You can be a wilful obstructionist.  We are somewhere in the middle there.”

The commissioner believes the changes to the scheme will punish industries, like forestry, that have invested in reducing greenhouse gases.

She warns that if business doesn't pay a direct cost for its emissions there is less incentive to move to a low carbon economy – something that could ultimately make New Zealand less competitive.

3 News

Post a Comment

Before commenting, please take the time to read our moderation guide


(Won't be published)



Comments

23/10/2012 10:39:23 a.m.

Carlos wrote:

ETS should be scrapped. Its an unwanted, 'unnecessary tax'. Climate has been changing all around the World long before Man existed. That's what climate/weather does !

22/10/2012 8:44:17 p.m.

Mike wrote:

Nathan I was being objective.

The claims look nice but the trial linked is a bit small to be objective, hence we need better/more data and more knowledge whats in biozest. It could be good, or it could be tiny trials with data that wont be reproduced if used widespread. Thats the problem with what amounts to tiny trials.

Yes hectares of trial is still tiny. It needs more testing. The testing looks good, but its needs a lot more. This is why drug trials wont have 2 patients getting drugs and 2 not (and call it a study), as the variation is too extreme to get meaningful data from such small sample sizes.

Just like party drugs, knowing what is in a product is important, even if perfectly legal etc. Biozest sounds envirofriendly but till know more about it, hard to know what it may do and if it has other side effects than those benefits stated.

I'm not writing it off, I'm saying need more trials etc to find out more about its potential.

NZ farming is around 3% of world dairying. So what is potentially $200 mil for NZ sales could be over $6 billion in world sales (just in Dairy) if get a lot more data to back biozest up. If add all the crop farming and beef, probably more like 10x that. The 2 comparisons show plant growth better, so why not better crop growth, or better grass growth for beef too?

22/10/2012 11:58:28 a.m.

sam wrote:

Endless welfare for farmers what a joke!!

22/10/2012 11:17:55 a.m.

Nathan Balasingham wrote:

Mike, if the manufacturer makes $200mil PA it follows that the farmers will make a net profit of $1.33 billion PA. Both parties will pay tax. Consider also the repercussion multiplier benefit to our economy. I presented the science, trial protocol and results at the Agricultural Biotech international conference in Rotorua in August this year. If anyone wants to peer review or would like me to repeat my presentation please contact me. The technology is important for New Zealand please be objective Mike. Nathan Balasingham, Director, Indigo Ltd phone 09 238389

22/10/2012 7:47:15 a.m.

Mike wrote:

If take NZ dairying, $150 per hectare with biozest, thats around $200 mil PA for its makers.

Now while the claims look nice, have been similar claims in the past which have later seen them shut down for not living up to their own hype. Need better/more data and more knowledge what is actually in biozest too.

21/10/2012 8:21:50 p.m.

Nathan Balasingham wrote:

It is time we rub off the line in the sand and consider that pastoral green house gas is pollution. Pastoral green house gas production is due to inefficient systems wasting valuable resources. If we fix the inefficiency we can make more money out of the same resources! A proven transformational technology increases net farm returns by at least $1000 per hectare while reducing green house gas liabilities. Refer to http://www.biozest.com/Proof.html Just imagine how wealthy this country will be if 10% of farmers used this technology. The farmers will financially benefit without a lag period because the effect is realised in days. This means there is no cash bleed on the farmer because it delivers a cash flow profit within days! Our farmers have the opportunity to become earners of carbon credits. Government, farming and business leaders need to look at this technology objectively. Nathan Balasingham, Director, Indigo Ltd phone 09 2383893

21/10/2012 11:56:44 a.m.

Mike wrote:

Farming already pays ETS. What is being excluded currently is biologicals, which nobody in the world currently taxes.

What will happen if we tax biologicals?

Well our Dairy prices in NZ will have to double to cover the cost of ETS. Its a local tax and Dairy doesn't set world prices so they cant charge more for world dairy prices which only leaves local prices to recover the local ETS tax.

The ETS of biologicals is built around penalty rates of methane. If apply this to forrestry, then any natural decay (including forrestry) produces methane, and would see even the greenest forrest being taxed based on the penalty rates of methane outweighing the carbon soak. The worlds biggest methane producer is the amazon jungle, so it would be greener to cut it all down according to our ETS scheme if forrestry was taxed on methane production like our ETS targets biologicals.

pre-1990 forrestry is excluded from our carbon model. Why? If we exclude pre-1990 forrestry we also need to exclude pre-1990 farming emmisions to balance this up. It was some head-up-backside group set up our ETS with no balance.

If biologicals that earn no money can be taxed like cows? What about other biologicals like beneficaries?

21/10/2012 11:27:49 a.m.

Jim Seaview wrote:

QUOTE: "But the Greens say we are not doing okay. “You can be a world leader,” says Green MP Kennedy Graham “You can be a fast follower. You can be an apathetic spectator. You can be a wilful obstructionist. We are somewhere in the middle there.” SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE will do me. Could someone please tell the Green Party that we do NOT share their Idealogy that we want to be a WORLD LEADER in reducing greenhouse gasses. We only need to do our small part with respect to the relative size of NZ and the rest of the world. The Farming sector is our largest exporter (yes they pay most of our bills) and therefore should get continued exemption of agriculture ETS costs from the scheme until at least 2015. In three years time it will end and everyone will be happy.

21/10/2012 11:07:14 a.m.

Wolfrun wrote:

More bribes from National to their mates who keep them in power. Paul:- Grow up mate.

21/10/2012 8:38:35 a.m.

Tim H Allen wrote:

Ive worked out how to charge industry & farmers a carbon tax without costing jobs or making them less competitive. Charge the tax only on profit. So if the farmer or business makes no profit one year then they dont have to pay any carbon tax that year. The years they do make a profit they pay a percentage of that profit in carbon tax. The % will vary depending on their emmissions.