The Government is feeling the pressure on their ideological Farming Tax and are trying to spin their way out of it, with their announcement last week pretending to make meaningful change on how farmers’ sequestration is treated.

If you’re up for the details, click here to read up about the sequestration announcement and why the announced changes amount to no real change.

But all you really need to know is that:

• Sequestration is when carbon is taken out of the atmosphere and stored away, like in wood or the ground.
• The Government’s big announcement is trying to make it sound like they are giving farmers a meaningful concession by recognising more of the emissions they take out of the atmosphere.
• But when you look at the fine print, most of the trees and vegetation won’t count, so farmers are left where they started, having to reduce stock and plant pines all over their land to pay the Farming Tax.

The basics of the Farming Tax remain.

Study after study shows that Kiwi farmers are the most emissions-efficient in the world.

The Farming Tax will punish them for already being more efficient than everyone else, forcing them to reduce stock numbers.

That reduction will further drive up food prices for everyone and decimate rural communities, push farmers off their land, workers out of jobs, and local economies into decline.

But for all that pain and suffering, the Farming Tax won’t help reduce global emissions, as less efficient foreign farmers will just take up that space in the market.

Current Government policies are already pushing farmland into trees, potentially pushing global emissions up.

The Farming Tax will dial this process up, all to benefit the Prime Minister’s international communications strategy – or at least, that’s the only benefit we can figure.

The Government’s hollow announcement changes none of this.

Michael, the pressure must be getting to them if they feel like they have to make these sorts of attempts to look like they care.

Separate to the sequestration issue, I appeared on the Common Room to explain how Kiwi farmers are the most efficient in the world and that taxing them won't help climate change.

Give it a watch if you haven't seen it yet.

Your support enables us to keep the pressure on and keep everyone informed on just how bad the Farming Tax will be, for everyone.

Thanks for your support.

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Kind regards

Bryce, Laurie, Mel, and the team at Groundswell NZ