Cattle Methane Emissions in Australia - Lower Than We Thought!!

Methane emissions from Australian cattle are 24% lower than previously estimated, according to data based on eight years of research into ways to reduce emissions in livestock. 

The new method has been published late in 2015 in the journal Animal Production Science and resulted in an update of the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory (NGGI).

CSIRO’s Ed Charmley said the work was conducted because of concerns about the large differential between NGGI and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) methane emission figures for Australian cattle, as well as doubt surrounding the accuracy of previous calculation methodologies used for cattle — particularly northern Australian cattle.  “Different methods used to calculate emissions from livestock in temperate and tropical regions were based on studies done in the 1960s and 1990s, mainly with dairy cattle,” Dr Charmley said.  “Both of these past methods were found to be likely overestimating the emissions from cattle.”

Dr Charmley said the revised method is based on improved ways of estimating ruminant methane emissions from forage-fed beef and dairy cattle, and has been tested against international defaults provided by the IPCC. The method has also brought the NGGI in line with the estimates of the IPCC, much to the delight of Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA).

“This revelation clearly shows livestock-based emissions are nowhere near what they were thought to be and will help improve the accuracy of Australia’s national greenhouse gas emissions estimates,” said MLA General Manager, On-farm Innovation Dr Matthew McDonagh.  “This is positive news for the Australian livestock sector as it seeks to continually improve its production efficiencies and demonstrate its environmental credentials.”

MLA Manager, Sustainable Feedbase,  Tom Davison added that the latest research findings from the National Livestock Methane Program (NLMP) show there are a number of simple management measures producers can implement to substantially reduce methane emissions while increasing productivity.  “Some of these are as simple as integrating leucaena into grazing systems, improving growth rates or herd reproductive performance, while other future techniques may include feeding red-algae to livestock and have been prioritised for further research,” Dr Davison said.  

We look forward to continuing to make further gains in this field for the mutual benefit of both our livestock industries and environmental sustainability.”

Read more: http://sustainabilitymatters.net.au/content/energy/news/cattle-methane-emissions-are-lower-than-we-thought-45757300#ixzz4KD4QqLEp

Northern Beef Producers Not Sustainable

It is beef week in Rockhampton this week, the biggest gathering of beef producers around Australia. A simple take home message from elder statesman of the northern beef industry assessment says that over 80% of producers are not sustainable - they are slowly going broke!

Methods to fix this and raise productivity have been developing over the past 40 years in many areas, with the less variable areas of the north better positioned generally.  Gains in productivity in some herds including a few modest sized ones were outstanding - with calving especially now being around 80% and still rising, often due to quite ruthless culling of non productive cows.

Whether it is better calving %, breed selection for higher productivity, bull performance, nutrition, new labour saving technology, remote operational systems and so on, many of the solutions to bring increases in productivity are well known...........and hardly rocket science.  Yes, they need integrating but a start can be made.

Some 20% are doing a-okay, but this shocking 80% are not.

I have not seen the regional breakdown.........but there has been a few years of drought across NW Queensland, which might be part of the story.  And the drier inland areas are inherently highly variable - but to some extent that can be planned for too, it happens inevitably!

Read the article.....sobering reading, but even better read the report on the industry. 

Do something - if you are a beef producer in the north.

Northern beef producers not sustainable

VERNON GRAHAM  08 May, 2015 04:00 AM

Qld Country Life  online

Farm business consultant, Phil Holmes.

Prices received by Top End cattlemen were having no impact on their profitability

ONLY 20 per cent of beef producers in northern Australia are economically sustainable in the long term, says veteran farm business consultant Phil Holmes.

The other 80pc have almost no skills in finance and debt management, and little understanding of the key profit drivers in their herds.

They also have a poor attitude to adopting new technologies to increase the efficiency of their businesses, and have a poor capacity to manage climate risks.

Mr Holmes outlined this bleak view of the performance of beef farms in the Top End to a Meat and Livestock Australia producer forum at Beef 2015 in Rockhampton.

He draw on the findings of the latest Northern Beef Situation Analysis, which was first produced in 2013 and has now been updated. Mr Holmes was involved in the preparation of both reports, which covered 14 regions across northern Australia.

The latest report was based on 12 years of data and focused on eight performance criteria around the ability of a business to generate enough profit to cover operating expenses and capital investment, and repay debt on time while providing returns to the owners comparable to the standard average annual wage.

Businesses also needed to be able to maintain equity at 85pc, survive succession planning with the farm and family intact and the retiring generation with enough money to enjoy independent lives.

Only 20pc of beef businesses in northern Australia measured up, Mr Holmes said.

The “big picture” for the other 80pc was to lift the productivity of their herds, land and people, but he couldn’t see that happening despite the ready availability of the knowledge and research findings to achieve increased profitability.

He said the market would most likely solve the problem and suggested astute buyers may get some bargains in three or four years' time.

Many northern Australian beef producers had been swept up in the property price bubble in 2002 which had resulted in ridiculous land prices.

'High' beef prices

Equally ridiculous was current talk about high beef prices which, in real terms, were on a par with those of 1985, Mr Holmes said.

He said prices received by Top End cattlemen were having no impact on their profitability.

The big driver of profitability was productivity gains – or the lack of them for most producers – in herd performance, along with the need to reduce business costs.

Reproduction rates and genetics had to be improved and mortality rates reduced to lift productivity gains beyond their average of just one per cent a year in northern Australia’s beef sector.

Meanwhile, the industry’s terms of trade were shrinking by two per cent a year. The scene was set for many producers to go out backwards, Mr Holmes said.  A more productive herd would also reduce grazing pressure and improve environmental sustainability.  Operating costs such as labour and investment spending needed to be tailored to have the most impact in terms of productivity and profits.

The rule should be one full-time employee per 2000 AEs (adult equivalents), Mr Holmes said.

Fodder for Asia – Can the NT Be Part of the Developing Fodder Trade

 

A recent article in the online edition of Queensland Country Life argued the case that northern growers might think to target Asia for feed grain and fodder, rather than the current focus on exporting protein crops, noodle wheat and oilseeds.

See here - http://www.queenslandcountrylife.com.au/news/agriculture/cropping/general-news/fodder-for-thought/2664351.aspx?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter

There is some strong rationale to give this some serious thought.
Other issues may make some of these ideas difficult to execute, with issues such as freight problems including actually getting material over the wharf and onto vessels and appropriately costed freight rates, attractive enough to make it worthwhile.

But that does not exclude trying.

With a strong trade in export live cattle and boxed beef to Indonesia, and a developing trade in boxed beef and live cattle to China and adjacent countries, developing options for fodder is not silly.

feeding dairy cattle

Northern regions can grow vegetation, and there are a number of producers of feed for export live cattle vessels.  So producing quality hay and fodder is possible, as is fodder cube mixes.

Can we do it easier and better than grain production?  I believe so.

There are perception issues – of some significance.  The northern region of Australia does not easily grow Lucerne [ alfalfa] that elusive “best quality “fodder so in demand for dairy cattle and increasingly for finishing stock [ both cattle and sheep] for slaughter in Asia.  While lucerne has a good track record, there are alternatives that can stack up in comparison with near similar protein levels, and general nutritional levels, and some of the cubes produced can be adjusted to give levels of what the user demands.

Inherently, tropical fodder is considered probably less digestible than most temperate feeds, due to higher fibre levels and a different stem structure.  But that may not be deal breaker.

The real deal breaker is likely to be actually getting the material into the market cost effectively.  How can this be overcome?  The market is growing, a well identified fact, and Australian fodder is going into the market now.  Can the NT also get into that market for fodder, a market expected to grow significantly?

Live Cattle Trade - A Producers View

A lot of words have flowed over the past few weeks on this topic.

The quality of the debate has been extremely partisan, and northern cattle producers feel rather miffed. Most comment against the existing trade has come from southern Australia.

One needs to differentiate the trade in live animals, and their slaughter. Does not seem to have been done by most anti the current practices.

Where were all the gurus offering to build abattoirs and facilites for local north Australia processing over the past 20 years or so so that the animals could be processed here? Talk is cheap.......show me the $$$$ for an abattoir in Darwin, Broome, Wyndham or Kununurra, let alone Karumba in Queensland. NEVER HAPPENED.

There have been more serious discussions over the past 2-4 years, and maybe one will get built.......but not before sometime in 2012. Oh, by the way.........that meat is probably not going to Indonesia anyway.

Read the article by a local NT Cattle producer, about 100kms south of Darwin.

Very poignant and pertinent!
Link is here - http://www.ntnews.com.au/article/2011/06/25/243211_opinion.html

Australia's Tropical Beef Herd - Methane Emissions Lower Than Current Estimates

New CSIRO research indicates that the amount of methane emitted from cattle fed on tropical grasses in northern Australia is up to 30 per cent less than figures currently used to calculate the northern cattle industry's contribution to Australia's greenhouse gas accounts.

Speaking at a recent Lansdown Field Day near Townsville, Queensland, CSIRO research leader Dr Ed Charmley said the findings would help to refine the nation's greenhouse gas accounting."

Measurements from cattle in CSIRO's custom-built respiration chambers show that Brahman cattle fed a wide range of tropical grasses emit up to 30 per cent less methane than previously determined. "While you always have to be cautious in extending lab data to the field and across an industry, we have been able to cross-check our findings with methane detecting laser systems used in the field."

These findings, while not changing the actual emissions, could have significant implications for calculating the emission footprint of the northern cattle industry and also for Australia's greenhouse gas accounts. "Methods used to determine these national greenhouse gas accounts are regularly reviewed and if the new data are confirmed via this review process, future accounts will be adjusted to reflect the lower emissions for the northern beef herd," Dr Charmley said.

With about half of the nation's beef herd located in northern Australia, current greenhouse gas accounts indicate that methane from the northern cattle industry contributes about 4.5 per cent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. As a by-product of digesting plants, ruminant livestock such as sheep and cattle produce methane and, of those, beef cattle produce the most - about 200 grams a day, or about 1.5 tonnes of CO2 equivalents per animal every year."

CSIRO research also shows that northern cattle fed on a diet of predominantly Leucaena, a legume tree, emit less methane than cattle grazing on tropical grasses," Dr Charmley said. "What this nutrition research is showing is that there can be win-win scenarios for the industry and the environment if we can redirect the breakdown of plant material in a way that reduces the amount of methane produced while improving the amount of energy or weight gain that animals get from their feed. "We are addressing cattle methane emissions from several angles - from examining the gut microbes that produce methane from ingested pasture and alternative diets, to a landscape focus on northern Australia's extensive grazing systems using state-of-the-art technologies, such as lasers and wireless sensor networks, to measure and model cattle methane emissions under tropical conditions."

The Lansdown Research Station is a key part of CSIRO's broader research programs on livestock production and emissions reduction in agriculture.

Lansdown Research Station is funded by the Australian Government's Climate Change Research Program, Meat & Livestock Australia and CSIRO and is one of five national research hubs and demonstration sites for practical methane management on-farm.

While this CSIRO press release is encouraging news for the northern beef producers, it is still to be verified in other research.

It seems to also confirm that using higher digestibility forages - in this case leucaena, a legume, it is possible to further lower methane emissions. This is similar to broad results from research work in temperate regions on dairy cows where lowered methane emissions were also corelated strongly with use of higher quality [ digestibility] feed.

There has been a trend in the past 20 years to push for more grass in beef pastures as compared to earlier periods of northern development when pasture legumes were seen as more important - then related to higher protein levels in the diet. Unfortunately, most grass now eaten by stock is on the dry side, with quite low digestibility, especially in more extensive pastoral regions. Changing digestibility can be done through plant breeding, but that is unlikely to happen any time soon. Tropical grasses also tend to be of lower digestibility intrinsically than temperate pasture species.

Leucaena is a viable option in many areas, although getting pasture areas established is time consuming and costly. It does have well proven performance in growing and finishing stock across many regions of north Australia. Superb results were achieved about 25 years ago in the Ord Valley at kununurra, but not too many producers are using the system - why would you, when live export has been the normal practice and there is little bonus for good quality finished cattle, with high carcase quality, in the north of Australia.

Lowered estimated methane emissions might quell some of the wild statements made about how awful the beef herd is environmentally though!