New Zealand is scrapping a scheme to price gas emissions from livestock — squelching a so-called burp and fart tax initiated under the previous left-wing government led by now departed authoritarian Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.
New legislation will be introduced to parliament this month by the ruling conservative coalition to remove the agriculture sector from a new emissions pricing plan, thus responding to farmer pressure that the plan would make their business unprofitable.
“The government is committed to meeting our climate change obligations without shutting down Kiwi farms,” said Agriculture Minister Todd McClay.
“It doesn’t make sense to send jobs and production overseas, while less carbon-efficient countries produce the food the world needs.”
The New Zealand economy is driven by agriculture with around 10 million cattle and 25 million sheep roaming the nation’s pastures.
As Breitbart News reported, the Ardern government proposed taxing the gasses farm animals create from burping, farting, and peeing as part of a plan to reset agricultural production and “tackle climate change.”
Her Labour administration claimed what it called a farm levy would be a world first and farmers should be able to recoup the cost by simply charging consumers more for their products.
Critics saw it simply as a punitive tax on farmers and their produce.
That has now been reversed and farmers welcomed the decision.
But environmental groups rounded on the government, which also announced plans at the weekend to reverse a five-year ban on new oil and gas exploration, AFP reports.
“From pouring oil, coal and gas on the climate crisis fire, the government has now put half of our emissions which come from agriculture into the industry-led too-hard basket,” said Greens co-leader Chloe Swarbrick.
Greenpeace accused the government of “waging an all-out war on nature.”