In 2025 New Zealand farms and growers will start paying for agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The way these prices will be calculated and paid is currently up for discussion, and we urge you to have your say.
Two pricing options have been developed by the He Waka Eke Noa (HWEN), the pan-sector agricultural industry group set up in 2019 to investigate potential alternatives to the 'backstop' ETS option. The two HWEN options are a Farm-level levy and a Processor-level hybrid levy. If the government is not satisfied with either of these options, they may choose to revert to the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) 'backstop' option.
To help you to understand theoptions currently under consideration, FAR has developed a series of information sheets (see below). These outline each option in some detail, and provide summaries comparing the pros and cons of each option for agriculture in general, and for arable in particular. We have also modelled some examples of how much each system might cost your farm; and provided background information on exactly what gases are included in on-farm emissions and how on-farm sequestration will be recognised.
FAR will also be running call-in sessions during February where staff will be on hand to answer any of your questions. Check out the Events page of the FAR website for the dates, times and call-in links.
It is important to note that the diversity of arable farm systems makes it impossible to provide generic estimates of the likely cost of the three greenhouse gas emissions pricing options for any one business. This is why it is so important for you to work out your farm's emissions number.
Several tools are available to do this, and E-Check, which has been created by FAR, specifically for arable farms is one of the easiest to use. E-Check can be found in the Environment and Compliance section of the FAR website. Go to E-Check.
The consultation process runs until 1 March 2022.
HWEN pricing survey - complete it here
Information sheets and summaries
Backstop-agriculture-in-the-nz-ets.pdf
Option 2 Processor level split gas levy
Pros-and-cons-of-each-option-for-arable.pdf
Estimated-pricing-impacts-on-arable-farm-systems.pdf
Biogenic-greenhouse-gas-emissions.pdf
