Sir Lockwood Smith: Former Speaker of the House on the government's new Methane targets

The government has changed methane targets, aiming to make the changes easier for farmers. 

The Government's slashed the 2050 targets to 14% to 24% below 2017 levels, it was previously 24% to 47% lower than previously.

Former Speaker of the House Sir Lockwood Smith told Kerre Woodham that this change is the right decision. 

He said that it would be a bad idea to impede New Zealand's meat and dairy production when the business will fall to 'countries that actually put out more methane and more carbon dioxide in producing it.'

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the carry Wood, a morning's podcast from
news Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
He'd be.

Speaker 3 (00:12):
So, look, good Smith, good morning to you.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Kerry, good morning to you. Been fascinated by the discussion
you're having at the moment. And maybe I should just
point out my scientific credentials before, long before I was
ever a politician, I don't consider a PhD in rumen
at metabolism. I was both a massy scholar and a
communalth scholar and the age of twenty one e lecturer
in romen metabolism and scientific method And so now I

(00:38):
have a little bit of background of this stuff. And
what made me call you was this morning I was
watching Breakfast while I was doing my morning exercises, and
I almost collapsed during the press ups when I heard
a young woman from is it Lawyers for Climate Change
or something, a lawyers group about climate change talking about
the government's decision, and she was just so hormus leading.

(01:01):
I just about choked. And you know, the point I
wanted to share with you is that there's such ignorance
around this whole thing. I mean, we humans are undoubtedly
putting more carbon dioxide and methane and greenhouse gases in
the atmosphere and there indugly having some effect, but the
issue is how much, And it's the ignorance that worries

(01:23):
me so much. So few people seem to understand our
food doesn't matter whether you're a vegan, a vegetarian, or
a person who eats meat or whatever. Your food is
all made from carbon dioxide. That's what it's made from.
And so what farmers do is sequest a carbonoxide. If
they don't actually sequester carbonoxide from atmosphere, they produce no food.

(01:45):
And one of the reasons why, of course New Zealand
has higher methane emissions per capita than most other countries
is we produce a lot of food. And you know,
we've only got five million people, yet we feed tens
of millions. And the crucial thing is that the food
we produce, especially that produced from livestock, is more carbon efficient,

(02:06):
because the crucial thing is how efficiently we can capture
carbon dioxide and turn it into food. That's the crucial thing.
And a lot of scientists are now starting to get
a bit concerned about where the whole climate change thing
around food production is going, because if we carry on

(02:27):
the way the IPCC is currently going, we'll end up
with countries like New Zealand that have the lowest emissions
per unit of nutrient value of food produced in the world,
reducing our food production, and countries with a higher level
of emissions per unit of nutrient value having to increase

(02:47):
their production, which would be just absurd for those interested
in climate change. So I think the other thing that
I do at the moment as well as farming. Of course,
I'm out on the farm at the moment as I
chair the board of the writ of Research Institute, which
is New Zealand's center of research excellence on food science.
So I'm writing involved with this whole issue of food science,

(03:08):
if you like. And what I'm trying to encourage more
scientists to do is to speak up and get more
focus on this issue of carbon efficiency. How we can
produce meat and dairy products that are so important for
human nutrition because of their essential available essential amino acid content,

(03:29):
which is so important. How we can keep making that
more and more efficiency. Isn't it come back and saying
we're the best in the world. We do nothing. We
must keep making the carbon efficiency of what we're producing,
improving that all the time, And that's fine. We've actually
got the rod. It is hosting a major international conference

(03:49):
early next year in Wellington. It'll be called the Agri
Food Summit for New Zealand, and I'm hoping we'll all
have a bit of an exploration of that issue to
get more and more people talking about this need for
better carbon efficiency because when more carbon efficiently farmers are,
the more profitable we are, because yeah, methane emissions is

(04:10):
just wasted energy. And so the other thing that a
lot of people are realize is because we talked about
methane emissions from livestock, and people seem to think that
cows produce methane like magic. But of course all that
methane comes from carbon dioxide. That's where it comes from.
And a cow has to consume me an awful lot

(04:31):
of siglos, which is made from carbon dioxide, before it
emits a single kilogram of methane. And again the stuff
is not incorporated into the accounting system that that lawyer
was talking about this morning. The international accounting system and
methane emissions is just deeply, deeply flawed. Sorry about that. Rave.

Speaker 3 (04:50):
No, no, I welcome the rave because you do I
mean you, I don't understand enough. I really don't, and
it's good to have it explained clearly and concisely. What
was the woman lawyer Lawyers for Humanity or lawyers some anticostis, lawyers.

Speaker 2 (05:07):
For climate change, lawyers, the Lawyer's Council for Climate Change.
What was she?

Speaker 3 (05:12):
What was her point?

Speaker 2 (05:15):
Her point was that that the accounting system, the separation
of methane from cardon dixide because it's different time in
the atmosphere, shorter half life, if you like, in the atmosphere,
was saying. She was saying, that's all flawed. That actually
the IPCC approached the National Infantries is the is the
only way we should be looking at it. And of

(05:36):
course she's so wrong. She was claiming it all scientists
say that's the only way to go, and she's wrong.
Many key scientists in the world around the whole issue
of climate change arguing that methane should be treated differently
from carbon dioxide because of its different half life and
the atmosphere, the different period of time it spends in

(05:57):
the atmosphere. And that's why the government, I think, has
reacted the way it has. It would be madness for
New Zealand to reduce our meat and dairy product production
in this country, only to have a produced by countries
that actually put up more meatthane and more condoxide in
producing it. But the other key thing that I'm trying

(06:18):
to encourage scientists to speak up on because a lot
of scientists, as you've been listening to other callers talk about,
are frightened to speak up because as a scientist in
recent years, if you dared depart from the narrative, your
scientific future and good. And it's not going to be
a good outcome from this unless we start getting honest
about it. And the key issue is emissions in relation

(06:42):
to a unit of nutrient value, because there is such
a difference in the nutative value of different foods we eat.
And I'm pretty well in a position to talk about
that chair the board of our top food science research institute,
and so I'm able to hear this discussion and try
and encourage a better understanding of what it's all about.

Speaker 3 (07:06):
Well, the next time we're talking about it, if you
don't hear and call, and then we will certainly be
following up and phoning you. Goodness, we've got you on speed.
Deal with the comments around the speaker and comments on farming.
So thank you.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
I thank you very much for tod a program in Australia, Kerry.
But long before over did those TV shows in New Zealand,
I still with Science Show for kids after school in
Australia while I was doing my PhD, and we covered
a lot of interesting things like this on television and
so I've always science has always been a big part
of my life.

Speaker 3 (07:38):
Well, thank you for sharing it. Nice to talk News
Talk said B eight to eleven.

Speaker 1 (07:43):
For more from Kerry Wood and Mornings, listen live to
News Talk Said B from nine am weekdays, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio.