The Country 14/05/25: Katie Milne talks to Jamie Mackay

This West Coast dairy farmer, and former president of Federated Farmers, says we need to change how we measure methane in the atmosphere, and she questions our commitment to the Paris Agreement. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yesterday's conversation on the Country was all about the ruminant
methane survey from groundswal, Methane Science, Accord and enz farming.
Another conversation was whether we should be in or out
of Paris. I'm going to come back to that one.
But some interesting feedback I got on the show yesterday
via the text line came from Katie Milne, West Coast

(00:20):
dairy farmer, former president of Federated Farmers, the woman who
broke the grass ceiling. And Katie, you, for your sins,
had to go to one of those cop conferences and
you're up in arms about us not using GWP STAR
as a measuring mechanism for methane.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah. Actually, for my sins, I've been two of them,
to be fair, but it was interesting. The first one
I went to was part of the New Zealand delegation
and the data and research had not too long been
out about global warming potential star versus global warming potential
one hundred and that clearly showed that there was less

(01:00):
act from methane and if you didn't add animals to
your system, you weren't increasing warming. That was put forward
by myself and others in conversations around the traps over there,
and why wouldn't this be accepted or when can this
be brought into the system, because it's a fear away,
it's been peer reviewed and it does reflect properly what

(01:24):
actually happens with warming. And to my charge in horror,
a lot of people said, yep, that's all good. It
can come into the mix at some stage, but it
won't be till quite a few years down the road
because of the cyclical nature of the cops and metrics
will be done at that stage. I think it's twenty nineteen,
in about another seven years so, and I just like

(01:47):
flabbergasid It's like, if you've got cutting edge data research,
it's peered reviewed and makes sense and is accepted by
the IPC, why on Earth wouldn't you put it through?
Because aren't we after the best results for the planet
all around and for whatever industry you're in, obviously or sector,
but especially for farmers all around the globe. This was

(02:11):
a message that actually, if you're doing things as efficiently
as you can with your animals, that's okay, that's the
direction you should go. So that it sort of really
locked me for six actually that there was not a
lot of interest in pursuing it at any pace whatsoever.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
So if we use GWP star as a measuring mechanism,
the methane problem from ruminants basically disappears off the face
of the earth because there is no increased warming from animals.
But the counter argument to that one, and the only
playing devil's advocate here, Katie, is people will the climate change.
People will say, are half of New Zealand's emissions come

(02:51):
from animals?

Speaker 2 (02:52):
Well, that's a thing to do with our per capita
and what our country is good at. Our animals are
still the most efficient. Our production system is the most
efficient for methane, you know, per kilogram of output on
the planet. So you know, you've got to balance up
what is actually happening to the to on the broader

(03:14):
scheme of things versus just actually New Zealand. Your number
is high. Why is it high. It's not because we've
got industrial car manufacturing and lots and lots and lots
of coal fired generation. We've got a little bit. We
have this, you know, grass fed beef and meat milk,
which in land, which everybody's looking for. If you go

(03:35):
and look at what trends are around the world for consumers.
They're moving towards that natural fed product hell for leather
as fast as they can get it because they are
seeing that that way is the way to go. And
why not take New Zealand products because it actually has
a low carbon footprint as well.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Now you won't get an argument from me just on
the Paris Climate Agreement whether we should be in or
out and ground swallow jumping up and down about this one.
Right as we speak, they're starting a new campaign on
this one. I know you didn't hear them, but Christopher
Luxon said on the show earlier, if we pull out
a Paris European countries are going to kick us to
touch and it's going to cost farmers a fortune.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
Well, that will be an interesting one to see because
it's I hope he's absolutely wrong, because our product is
top not all those things, as we know, but when
people go around the globe and talk to people, your
average punter doesn't talk about that at all. And the
Paris Agreement did say you have to protect food security
in the process of trying to reduce your emissions. So

(04:39):
you know, we know about amission's leakage. If we don't
do it, someone else picks it up and they don't
do it as efficiently, so overall it's a net loss
for the planet. But yeah, I know people and myself
when I've traveled around you talk to consumers, they want
food security and maybe it's a tiny, tiny, tiny few
point zero zero one that look at the carbon and

(05:01):
go yep, you've got to have this number right. But again,
we haven't told the story properly. We just get in
an echo chamber when we go to those sort of talks.
I feel and we played the orchestra that's singing at
the time, which is you have to reduce your number,
regardless of what it means. So we really have to

(05:22):
get our story out there better. And we all hear
that all the time, but it's the truth.

Speaker 1 (05:27):
We need to take them on our journey. Katie, I
hate that word. Hey, how are things on the West Coast?
Just to finish on, how's your season winding up? If
you dry it up, dry it up, try it off
yet Katie, we haven't.

Speaker 2 (05:40):
Quite dried off yet. It's been a cracker second half.
First half was too wet, it went dry straight away.
But it's been very, very mild, and so we've only
had a couple of frosts in May and the grass
is still checking over, starting to slow off as the
sunshine ours drop. But yeah, no, it's looking pretty good
for us, so we'll take it every time.

Speaker 1 (06:01):
O Katie. I'll leave you to go away and ponder
what you're going to do with all your money this season.
Always enjoy your input to the country and thanks for
listening yesterday.

Speaker 2 (06:10):
All good, Thanks Jamie.