Agroforestry: Saving the World with Mutton and Hurleys

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Agroforestry: Saving the World with Mutton and Hurleys

There are a number of threats facing small to medium sized beef farmers. Beef and sheepmeat are especially vulnerable to cost-benefit analysis involving the EU.

Professor Alan Matthews made a very strong case for a change in land use from livestock to forestry, based on Ireland's EU climate change commitments.

Though Matthews is Professor Emeritus of European agricultural policy at Trinity College Dublin, this is not idle academic pontification – Matthews sits on the recently formed Climate Change advisory Council, which is tasked with overseeing Ireland’s transition to a low carbon economy.

His point is that under new EU rules from 2020, forestry can be used as an offset, whereas now, livestock's full emissions are not measured. This, along with the level of beef and sheepmeat subsidy dependence - 75% on average for livestock in Ireland, with some areas such as the BMW region even more dependent - makes forestry noncompetitive at present. But not after 2020.

Naturally, the livestock sector is up in arms against Matthews, calling him unsuitable for his position on the expert panel. If he's one thing, however, its a dispassionate political economist of European agri policy, and, without doubt, both completely neutral and an expert of the highest standard.

While it can be argued that political economists lack the sociological nuance to fully grasp rural life and the benefits of Ireland's version of rural mid sized farming, there is a third way. This third way is not in any significant sense being developed here in Ireland, despite our potential suitableness for it. It is also given but a bracket's worth of reference in Matthews' work (linked to above)). This approach is agroforestry.

Agroforestry in Loughgall

Agroforestry, combined with some organic farming techniques should urgently be investigated as a possible climate change adaptation and mitigation strategy one which could keep rural Ireland populated, vibrant, producing beef and sheepmeat, while also increasing the number of tress on the land massively.

First the organic dimension. Crop rotations, feed grown on farms and the use of farm yard manure and clover for fertility, done at a genuinely apt stocking rate builds soil carbon and reduce the use of fossil fuels. That needs to be measured on a trial set of farms as soon as possible.

(The slightly lower stocking rate in organic is important for other EU targets such as the water frameworks and biodiversity directives)

Agroforestry, fused with these organic approaches, could transform the carbon footprint of Irish agriculture.

In Loughgall, Northern Ireland, there is a long running agroforestry experiment, in place since 1989 (pictured, above) .

Ash Trees were planted at 5m x 5m spacing giving 400/ha into managed ryegrass pasture (160kgNha-1). This is grazed with sheep from March to November.

Incredibly, there is no reduction available grass to the sheep for 12 years. And around 12 years in, the Ash trees come on as a crop themselves. They too are almost (but not quite) as productive as a woodland plantation in this set up.

Minor tweaking to compensate for the relative lag years from 11 to 14 (when the trees are bigger but not yet a crop, and when the grazing area is slightly reduced) may be needed.

400 trees per hectare would make a massive impact on Ireland's GHG emissions. That's in a ryegrass trial – imagine an organic sward with a dozen plus plants including N fixing clover?

The Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs) option of greening under Pillar 1 of the CAP specifically supports agroforestry as an option.

And more good news. In May of this year 12 categories in new forestry grant and premium scheme including agroforestry.

Oh and the crop that this new vision of farming and forestry fused would yield? Hurleys. Irish made, Irish farmed hurleys. Fighting climate change through mutton and ash, while saving rural Ireland from the incidental crudeness of political economy, or the self-serving climate change spin of the agri-food sector.

What could possibly be better than that?

Photo Mark McLoughlin CC attribution noncommercial 3.0

More

Agroforestry on this blog (2012) agroforestry round up (this blog)

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