NEWS
MACHINERY & PRODUCTS
Carpet maker to ditch synthetics. PAGE 15
New Fergies offer comfort and efficiency. PAGE 34
MANAGEMENT Blending facility offers southern farmers more feed choice. PAGE 28
TO ALL FARMERS, FOR ALL FARMERS AUGUST 11, 2020: ISSUE 707 www.ruralnews.co.nz
Big beef with UN NIGEL MALTHUS
A NEWLY formed beef industry group is condemning a United Nations campaign about the impact of the meat industry on the environment. A tweet from an official UN account claimed the meat industry is responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions
than the world’s biggest oil companies, contributes to the depletion of water resources and drives deforestation. The New Zealand Roundtable for Sustainable Beef chair, Grant Bunting, says the tweet was “outrageous” and “factually incorrect.” The tweet was later deleted in the face of widespread criticism, but
Bunting said the stated reason for its withdrawal was not that the claim was incorrect, just that the UN could not confirm the source. The underlying sentiment was still concerning, he told Rural News. “The UN’s role is to demonstrate leadership, promote
peace and bring countries and communities together. Singling out meat in this way for condemnation is unhelpful and inaccurate.” Bunting says the UN’s claims ignores science, aren’t solutionsfocused and don’t take into account the great work of farmers, industry, researchers and governments around
Making farmers proud again Federated Farmers new vice president Karen Williams wants the organisation to become the ‘go to’ body for farmers and help them have pride in what they do. Williams says, over the last few years, some farmers have been embarrassed to admit they are farmers. She wants this to change. She also wants to build a strong team culture within Feds and the whole primary sector to create an environment in which farmers feel proud about the fact that they are producing quality food and fibre. “We have a massive opportunity coming out of Covid to show that what we do is a really honourable job.” See full story pages 6-7
the world. “The statement doesn’t tell the whole story: at its most basic level the oil industry is releasing carbon that’s been locked away for millions of years. Meanwhile, meat producers absorb carbon in the pasture before emitting it. In addition, agricultural methane is largely depleted within 12 years,” he explains. “The food industry is in a unique position: while generating emissions, the production of food and fibre also has the potential to sequester carbon,” Bunting adds. “Around the world, meat is an essential protein and globally farmers are doing an amazing job at helping to feed the world.” The tweet was part of the UN #ActNow campaign, designed to raise awareness about climate change. That was not the problem, said Bunting. The Australian website beefcentral. com sought an explanation from the UN as to why the tweet was removed and received this reply: “The material in the tweet was deleted because it did not come from a UN source. “This does not mean we regard it as misinformation, we simply take care to use UN sources for the information in our tweets and that did not happen with this tweet, so it was withdrawn.” Bunting said that explanation in itself is concerning. “What does that suggest? The underlying premise is what, that this is a stance that the UN is looking to adopt? “There’s absolutely no science or TO PAGE 4
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