“Land sparing” farming could offset agricultural carbon emissions

(credit: climate.gov)

Agriculture is not responsible for the bulk of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions; that honor goes to more fossil-fuel intensive activities like transportation and generating electricity. Even still, greenhouse gas emissions from global agriculture are climbing by 1 percent a year.

Humans did once upon a time live without HDTVs and Hummers—we could do so again, at least in theory—but people will always have to eat. This makes reducing agricultural emissions particularly difficult. Researchers in the UK have reported that an approach called "land sparing" farming could offset the emissions coming from agriculture by sequestering carbon.

Land sparing increases the efficiency of existing farming practices, allowing more food to be produced on less land. The surplus farmland is then allowed to revert to a “natural” habitat. It all sounds sensible, and the paper led to a number of news articles earlier this month.

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