Farming the Sun

[Graham]

Pastoral grazing could be more energy efficient with this new seaweed discovery by CSIRO, and it reduces farm emissions.

http://newatlas.com/csiro-seaweed-co...issions/46021/

[Graham]

We've just recently updated the vBulletin forum to keep these posts alive, and should be able to allow comments from readers soon.

Today I read an interesting article from Keith Woodford about pine forestry on marginal hill-country farms:

https://www.interest.co.nz/rural-new...y+29+July+2021

Keith has done some research and notes that on average for such country at the moment, the ROI is about 2% p.a. when sheep/beef farming, but the IRR (internal rate of return) would be around 9.7% p.a. for a new 50-year permanent pine plantation, based on the current carbon credits pricing. He's quite right that there's really not much point in actually logging the trees, if they are too far from a port or a sawmill, and if the land is too steep with no logging tracks and skids already in place. Most years, you'd recover less for the logs than the costs of logging. I like the idea that faster growing natives could be substituted for pines (for a lower return), or that native trees would eventually take over.