Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 17 November 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Carbon Sequestration and Storage in Agriculture: Discussion

Photo of Michael FitzmauriceMichael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Would it not be accurate to state that at the moment we are talking about what a cow, a bullock or a heifer produces? We are able to provide figures on that. I do not know whether they are right or wrong. We do not know, on the other side, what we are taking in in hedges nationwide, what is on the motorways, what is planted in different parts of the country, what is coming in in barley or other different cereal crops, what grasses are sequestering, and what is being sequestered by all the different things that are out there in the rural areas. We have no clue. One would imagine that that should be measured before we start off making an assumption. It is not the Department that is making assumptions, but the media in general are trying to kick the daylights out of the farming sector. Basically, no credit is being given to the sector for what it is doing. At the same time, there does not seem to be any talk of what methane is coming out of the treatment plant in Dublin or what harm it is doing. Why have we not done an accurate assessment and enough research on all the different types of farming and what is being sequestered on a constant basis by the crops, including barley, wheat, trees and grass, when they are eaten and grow again? Why have we not done something like that?

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