When it comes to slowing down climate change, I say farmers are Australia’s VIPs because they’re vital in taking carbon out of the atmosphere at the scale we need to meet our Paris Agreement targets.

Turning off lights and producing renewable energy is important, but, to reduce the legacy load of carbon that’s already in our atmosphere we need carbon farming.

I started carbon farming more than 15 years ago. I left a city marketing job to farm fine merino wool on 1000 acres in the Mudgee district of New South Wales. I quickly learned that every single leaf, tree and pasture absorbed carbon into its structure, to its (and the atmosphere’s) benefit.

This week at the Australasian Emissions Reduction Summit I’ll talk about smoothing the way for carbon farming. I won’t be sugarcoating anything – I’m not in the mood because this is too damn important.

We need tens of thousands of hectares to be absorbing carbon to make a difference. With the National Farmers Federation’s net-zero carbon by 2050 target, and the Morrison government highlighting carbon farming in its Technology Investment Roadmap, we have the will.

Read the full piece in the Beaudesert Times.