DEAR SIR: Thomas Hubert and Barry Cassidy’s recent article shows that Teagasc director Gerry Boyle is prepared to take the easy way for agriculture to reduce its carbon footprint rather than the correct way, by targeting those with already lower emissions per kg of meat or milk produced.

The article goes on to show that the most profitable farms within the livestock sector are also the farms that release the least ammonia per kg of milk or meat produced, according to the Teagasc sustainability report for 2017.

However, the anomaly occurs in that the public’s perception is that less-intensive farms have a lower impact on carbon emissions per kg of milk or beef produced. So, rather than the burden of better carbon emissions falling on those who are already more efficient in this area, the director of Teagasc should take the bull by the horns and focus on that cohort who are least efficient, and how to reduce their emissions.

Rather than, as Gerry Boyle puts it, the burden of adjusting to the challenges of climate falling onto the more efficient farmers, as it is the easier option.

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Letter: taking the easy way out on emissions

"The director of Teagasc should take the bull by the horns and focus on the least efficient cohort, reducing their emissions" – Sean Cronin, Buttevant, Co Cork.