11/2/02
Sir,
The recent release of how much stock owners could be forced to pay for
their animal gas emissions if Australia ratifies Kyoto (Feb 2002, Australian
Farm Journal) has clarified one thing.
Kyoto will be inconsistent and injust - especially to landholders
The articles suggest producers could be paying for their animal methane
emissions and figures of $96 - $362 per dairy cow / yr , $60 - $230 per beef
cow / yr and $5 - $21 per sheep / yr are likely.
These costs are huge and would devastate stockowners, causing a huge upheavel
in grazing and dairy industries as land prices fall, more crops are
desperately grown, much land is destocked, and stockowners go broke.
But what will it achieve?
The use of non ruminant animals (ostriches, kangaroos, etc) to replace
ruminants will not be the answer, nor will vaccines to reduce methane
emissions as they are unlikely to be credited (reducing the carbon tax
amount).
Besides what is the sense of paying a tax for the animal emissions that arise
from stock eating grass, while not being paid (credited) for the grass grown
which removes CO2 from the air.
This is totally illogical and injust.
Of course animal and / or biomass emissions have been going on for thousands
of years and are not the real cause of EXTRA greenhouse gases being added to
the atomosphere anyway. The real cause is mostly from burning fossil fuels.
We demand some common sense in the greenhouse issue and suggest Australia
withdraws from Kyoto thereby
* Avoiding injustices associated with animal and biomass emission issues
* Avoiding the huge costs of a Kyoto beauracracy and
* Can concentrate on the real cause - reducing fossil fuel emissions e.g.
reducing the cost of producing renewable energy so fossil fuels can be
replaced - painlessly.
Leon Ashby, Kongorong, SA 5291 Ph 0887 389313
Dennis Fahey, "Keen Gea", Torrens Creek, Qld Ph 0747 417184
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