Agriculture has been identified as one of the economic sectors which was responsible for producing the “most greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions” in the first quarter of 2023, according to a new report published today (Wednesday, August 16).
The latest Eurostat report shows that households accounted for 24%, manufacturing was responsible for 20%, electricity and gas supply accounted for 19% while agriculture was responsible for producing 13% of total EU economy GHG emissions from January to March.
According to the research, transportation and storage produced 10% of sectoral emissions in the first quarter.
The Eurostat report also highlights that overall EU economy GHG fell by 3% in quarter one with emissions decreasing in five out of nine economic sectors.
The biggest decrease was noted in electricity and gas supply, which dropped by 12.3% while the main sector where emissions increased was transportation and storage which was up by 7.2%.
In the first quarter of 2023, EU GHG economy emissions totalled 941 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) – a 2.9% decrease compared with the same quarter of 2022 when it was 969 million tonnes of CO2e.
The latest Eurostat shows that GHG economy emissions fell in the first quarter of the year in almost all EU countries when compared with the first quarter of 2022.
However, this was not the case in Ireland where GHG emissions increased by 9.1%.
According to Eurostat, emissions also increased in Latvia (7.5%), Slovakia (1.9%), Denmark (1.7%), Sweden (1.6%) and Finland (0.3%).
Meanwhile, the largest reductions in GHG were recorded in Bulgaria, where they fell by 15.2%, Estonia by 14.7% and Slovenia by 9.6%.
Of the 21 EU countries that saw a decrease in GHG emissions, only six recorded a decrease in their GDP: Czechia, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Hungary, and Poland.
But 15 countries – including Portugal; Croatia; Belgium; Malta; France; Spain; the Netherlands; Germany; Austria; Romania; Italy; Cyprus; Greece; Slovenia; and Bulgaria – all managed to decrease GHG emissions while growing their GDP.