New Zealand is challenging other meat producing nations across the globe to match its ‘low carbon’ credentials, with the publication of a new report.

The research from there stated it can produce 15kg of carbon equivalent for 1kg of deadweight lamb, which is significantly below current figures for sheep meat in the UK. However, SRUC carbon expert, Dr Michael MacLeod, criticised the findings for not comparing like with like, as research methods are different in each nation.

New Zealand's report was commissioned by Beef + Lamb New Zealand and the Meat Industry Association and was undertaken by AgResearch. It claimed its sheep meat and beef had a lower carbon footprint than the UK's, even taking into account transport to market.

It also claimed that ‘consumers can feel confident that purchasing its red meat was a good choice for the environment.’ Kiwi producers pointed out they had reduced agricultural emissions by 30% since 1990 and are touting to become the UK’s ‘clean partner’ when the industry aims to hit ambitious climate change targets set by the government.

According to the New Zealand research, its sheep meat had a cradle-to-grave carbon footprint of just under 15kg of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per kg deadweight. The cradle-to-grave carbon footprint of beef in the report was just under 22kg of GHG emissions per kg deadweight.

However, Mr MacLeod, of SRUC, robustly pointed out that the situation was more complex than the simple numbers offered by AgResearch.

He told The SF: “The comparisons they make between New Zealand and other countries are misleading. Their claims aren’t really justified given the uncertainties involved and the differences between UK and New Zealand studies.

"It might be [correct that New Zealand are lower], but you can’t say it is, based on the evidence presented. The supposed 'world average' against which they compare themselves, is nothing of the kind. It is just an average from a small number of studies done in different ways, for different years.

"The authors themselves noted the studies exhibited ‘large differences in methodology’ and that ‘to enable a better comparison within/between countries, a recalculation of the footprints would be necessary’.

“The list of studies used in the comparison seems incomplete and relies on one or two sources for some countries. For example, the UK beef and lamb footprints seem to draw heavily on a study that used data collected at two Welsh farms 16 years ago, which is hardly representative of UK production now and some other studies seem to have been omitted, such as Sykes et al 2019.

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“It is puzzling that the authors didn’t mention all the work UN-FAO has been doing in this area over the last 15 years. It had spent a lot of time estimating the carbon footprints of livestock commodities using a consistent, well-documented method.

"In fact, it had just released its latest global analysis of GHG emissions arising from livestock production. According to these results, the average emissions of sheepmeat in Europe, the OECD and Australia/New Zealand (combined) are more or less the same, and all three are lower than the global average.

“Comparing beef is more complicated because, as the authors point out, beef from the dairy herd has a lower emissions. So the emissions of your beef depends largely on the relative size of your suckler and dairy herds.

“The report does a good job of quantifying emissions from NZ beef and lamb, and I agree with their point that (for red meat at least) ‘food miles’ should not be a determining factor for consumers. It also makes interesting points about trends over time in the carbon footprints; for example they found that sheepmeat emissions in NZ has decreased by 18% over the last 20 years, due to increases in ewe fertility and lamb growth rates.”

Sarah Miller, CEO of QMS, also took issue with the report’s findings and said it is a more complicated picture. She said: “When it comes to sustainability, emissions are only one piece of the jigsaw, with biodiversity, water quality and social sustainability being equally as important to ensuring the long-term future of red meat production in Scotland.

"QMS undertakes carbon emission accounting as part of our Enterprise Costings output and the 2022 edition shows that the average emissions based on liveweight for Scotland for a lowground flock is 11.5 Co2/kg which is below the world average figures quoted by Beef + Lamb NZ.

"In our enterprise costings, we do not report on a consolidated sheep production system as NZ have done – rather figures that represent different production systems in Scotland and we should note that the methodology they have used to calculate their figure looks to be different to the one we use.

“Carbon emissions and enterprise profitability are also influenced by the physical environment in which the enterprise takes place. The levels of rainfall, sunshine hours and temperature can not only influence animal productivity and performance but can result in considerable seasonal change in input use, for example fertilisers and animal feeds, and the need for fuel and electricity for extended field work and/or housing periods and feed preparation and delivery," she said.

"But the results do show how high levels of animal efficiency and productivity generally leads to lower emissions intensity.”

QMS had commissioned the production of the Scottish Red Meat Industry Net Zero Roadmap, which will include consolidated figures as NZ have produced from a 'field to shelf' cycle assessment.

This will be published in 2023 and will quantify where the Scottish red meat supply chain should focus investment and research.