The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue, has said Ireland has “an enormous task ahead” in adapting to climate challenges.
Speaking at the Agriculture and Climate Change: Science in Action conference – which took place at the Aviva Stadium yesterday (Wednesday, October 16) – the minister set out the journey ahead for farmers and the agriculture sector.
The conference saw a range of speakers and panel discussions discuss the latest science and policy developments relating to agriculture and climate change.
More than 500 delegates from across the agri-food sector attended the event.
The event was hosted by the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue, Minister of State with responsibility for research, Martin Heydon, and Minister of State for land use, Pippa Hackett.
Minister McConalogue
Minister McConalogue told delegates that the discussions which had taken place throughout the conference were “important”, and that there was a “shared commitment” to “addressing the challenges that climate change presents to Ireland and to the agricultural sector.
“Farming in this country is too important not to be supported in every way possible. It’s important for food security and economic sustainability, but also for our culture and identity.”
Minister Heydon also offered a positive outlook on Ireland’s climate targets, and said that agriculture is “right up there” when compared to other sectors in Ireland.
Heydon referred to farming practices that Irish farmers can improve on, calling them “low hanging fruit out there” that Irish farmers can implement into their enterprises.
The ‘low hanging fruit’ Heydon referred to were genetics and breeding, key topics that were discussed throughout the conference.
Tackling emissions
Minister McConalogue also highlighted “tools”, that can help agriculture and which were discussed at the conference, these included; reducing age of slaughter, reducing fertiliser use, changing fertilizer type, adopting clover and multi species swards, tapping into the potential of genetics and breeding indices.
“We’re fortunate to have a range of well-tested ‘ready to go’ solutions in the recently published Teagasc Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC).
“Approximately 60% of the measures are cost negative or cost neutral, and can be implemented now.
He said these ‘tools’ have been “proven” to improve efficiency, and that they “should be adopted immediately”.
These policies, the minister said, require “high adoption rates”, but he added his government is “supporting these ambitions from a policy perspective”.
Minister McConalogue also confirmed that he will travel to the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai in December – he said his attendance will “send a strong signal in terms of Ireland’s commitment to demonstrating leadership in the global climate debate”.
“We’re relatively unique in terms of a developed country with a large proportion of agricultural emissions,” he said.
Meanwhile Bill Callanan, chief inspector at DAFM, gave a stark reminder of Ireland’s use of fossil fuels, and said “this country imports €1,000,000 per hour of fossil fuels and a significant part of that is gas”.
Fertiliser use
Callanan referred to the 14% reduction of fertiliser use in 2022, and said that the data up to and including Q3 of 2023 has shown a 17% reduction.
He acknowledged that the driver behind the reduced use last year was “price”, but added that farmers have “embraced” the “direction of travel” that fertiliser use is going in.
Pat Dillon, director of research at Teagasc, said there will be “a big reduction” of fertiliser, and said that he does not agree that the reduced use of fertiliser in the last two years is “linked back to price”.
He referred to a Teagasc monitoring group of farmers that have reduced chemical nitrogen use through incorporating clover into their pastures.
He said this was “really positive” and added that once protected urea is “up and running”, the “reduction in chemical reactions will come”.
Protected urea was a topic of discussion for Marie Donnelly of the Climate Change Advisory Council, who asked “where are we with protected urea?”.
Donnelly said that opportunities are being “lost” by farmers not being able to buy the product locally, and said suppliers must be providing options to sell protected urea to farmers.