Supporter Information:
Meat & Livestock Australia Limited (MLA) delivers marketing and research and development services for Australia’s cattle, sheep and goat producers.
Funding comes from transaction levies paid on livestock sales, the Australian government and voluntary contributions from industry partners. MLA is a service provider to the red meat industry, not an industry representative body or lobby group.
Website: www.mla.com.au
Twitter: @meatlivestock
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Jasmine Boxsell
2022 Nuffield Scholar
Research to boost carbon options for the northern pastoral region
Jasmine Boxsell is well-placed to assess the potential challenges and opportunities for carbon reduction and sequestration in Australian’s northern pastoral industry, as Commercial and R&D manager for Consolidated Pastoral Company (CPC).
This will be the focus of her 2022 Nuffield Scholarship, supported by Meat & Livestock Australia.
CPC company operates eight cattle stations covering 3.6 million hectares in northern Australia, as well as two feedlots in Indonesia. One of Jasmine’s roles is to manage CPC’s carbon reduction projects and strategies for expansion in the carbon sequestration and co-benefits space.
As a Scholar, Jasmine is planning to visit regions with similar landscapes to northern Australia – Texas, New Mexico and California in the US, parts of Africa, and New Zealand – to identify carbon and land management practices that would encourage application and adoption here.
“Carbon offers producers the opportunity to demonstrate sustainability practices, reduce emissions and generate alternative income but so far adoption has been low – only 3% of active Clean Energy Regulator (CER) projects are linked to northern pastoral operations,” she says.
“It’s challenging. Methods are impractical in vast rangelands and can be confusing and intimidating, obligations can be difficult to obtain and maintain, entering project partnerships can be risky, methods have been legislated without verifying interest and gaps exist in the ability to apply innovative solutions.”
Through her scholarship, Jasmine sees plenty of opportunity to generate practical solutions and support, to build confidence and enable the beef industry to meet its goal to be carbon neutral by 2030.
“Pastoralists are showing increasing interest in carbon. Research groups are developing and presenting their own priorities with methods that are likely to be more applicable to industry, such as feeding asparagopsis (red seaweed) and 3NOP (an organic compound) to reduce methane emissions, but there’s no guarantee these will be adopted by the CER,” she says.
“I’m hoping that through my experience as a Nuffield Scholar I can provide insight and strategic direction to continue to bring opportunities to a broad network of progressive producers for business-complementary carbon projects.”
Jasmine’s Nuffield Scholarship is supported by Meat & Livestock Australia.
Ph: 0403 102 562
E: jasmine.boxsell@pastoral.com