THE BASICS of carbon farming were presented at a workshop held by the Northern and Yorke Landscape Board in Maitland, on Friday, September 13.

The Beginner’s Guide to Carbon Farming was a free event to help farmers better understand the benefits and risks of this emerging agricultural opportunity. 

It was presented by NYLB’s sustainable agriculture facilitator Molly O’Dea, who took attendees through some of the key concepts of carbon farming and discussed ways it can be applied locally, in both cropping and mixed farming enterprises. 

Ms O’Dea explained how farmers could reduce their carbon footprint, which is the annual amount of greenhouse gases emitted minus the amount of carbon stored by a farm. 

She also covered the emissions types, called scopes, that are part of a farm’s carbon footprint and the concepts of insetting and offsetting. 

Farmers were also introduced to greenhouse gas accounts and calculators, which allows the calculation of emissions and carbon stored. 

The 2.5-hour session was funded by the Commonwealth of Australia through the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment, and Water under the Carbon Farming Outreach Program and was the first in a series of workshops held across the Northern and Yorke region.

More workshops are planned and NYLB invites suggestions for locations, contact Molly O’Dea via molly.o’dea@sa.gov.au or call 8841 3444. 

For information about carbon farming, visit www.landscape.sa.gov.au/ny