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ARLA Foods Milk Partnership producers will, from the start of 2011, be part of the company’s drive to reduce its carbon footprint.
Engagement in the project will be voluntary, but Arla, which is fully funding the work, hopes large numbers of milk producers will take part, not only for reasons of reducing environmental impact, but by so doing, they can reduce on-farm costs.
The company claims it is the first dairy processor to include both its own operations and also those of its supplying farmers.
The company’s overall targets for its own operations are a 34 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions by 2020, from a 2005 baseline; 30 per cent of its energy to come from renewable sources by 2020 – and a 20 per cent reduction in water usage by 2015 plus zero waste to landfill by 2012.
It is already on the road to achieving what Arla admits are ‘challenging’ targets.
Since 2005, Arla UK has cut dairy greenhouse gas emissions by 18 per cent (20 per cent from packaging), water consumption by 6 per cent, energy consumption by 12 per cent and diesel use by 6 per cent. And it now has all the UK transport fleet using a bio-diesel blend.
Driving forward the environmental strategy is Evelyn Moriarty, Arla UK technical director.
“Having a robust set of environmental targets doesn’t just make ethical sense, it makes good business sense,” she said. “A strong set of environment credentials will soon be a pre-requisite to doing business and everyone must take responsibility if Arla is to make a real difference.”
Milk sourcing director Ian Brown is rolling out the initiative to producers.
“On-farm carbon reduction is a big challenge because it represents 80 per cent of our supply chain’s carbon footprint. Therefore, engaging with 1,400 producers and achieving support from them is crucial.
“Most of the things producers can do on their farms are those which will give an economic payback,” he said. “What we are doing in the farm services team is everything we can that influences returns – other than the milk price, because farm services colleagues have no influence on milk price.”
Realistic
He said an initial uptake of up to 50 per cent would be realistic but if the programme achieved what it was designed to (in terms of economic benefit), uptake should increase rapidly by word of mouth.
At farm level, the first step will be carbon footprint assessments together with a long-term programme of on-farm workshops – three a year over three years for 28 farmer groups.
The programme has been developed with Kite Consulting and ECO2 Project and the main focus is on animal health and welfare.
Mr Brown said it complemented Arla’s existing health and welfare initiatives – like a new Johne’s disease programme also due for launch in January.
Mr Brown said there would be no individual targets but producers would be able to compare themselves against a benchmark carbon footprint determined by the assessment.
Ash Amirahmadi, head of milk procurement said: “The project demonstrates our determination to lead the way in embracing the environmental challenges the dairy industry faces right through the supply chain. We believe the project has the potential to reduce carbon emissions at farm level by up to 20 per cent over time.”