No-till carbon credits to be marketed

Thursday, December 20, 2012

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

From now until March 15, 2013, Ontario no-till farmers have an opportunity to apply to become part of NorAg Resources Inc. carbon credit rewards program. The benefit, especially for farmers who have been practicing no-till for the last 10 years, could amount to thousands of dollars.

Ben Currelly, president and CEO of the Port Hope-based NorAg, hopes they will be able to attract enough farmers to aggregate one million acres into the program, which is only being offered in Ontario. They also hope they will be able to grandfather the benefit as far back as 10 years so farmers will gain not just from the last year of no-till farming but for up to 10 years.

“The verifier says we can go back 10 years,” Currelly says. However, the credits won’t be worth the same from year to year. Credits from 2002 will not be worth as much as credits from 2012.

They are marketing the credits to other companies such as banks and airlines. They will pay the farmers once the companies they sell to pay them (and they deduct their costs). The return will depend on the markets at the time of the sale.

Doing the math, Currelly says if the credits were marketed for 70 cents per acre (an arbitrary number) and a farmer had 1,000 acres under no-till, the benefit would be $700. If the farmer was able to verify 10 years of no-till, that could be worth $7,000.

While they hope to aggregate a large number of acres and go back up to 10 years, the window for this approach might not be left open for long.

“In the future,” Currelly says, “the sale of carbon credits will only be available for behavior that has changed. If you went from being a guy that tilled to no-till you might get credits that one time.” He adds, however, that such a restriction is not yet a certainty.

While the program offers more of an incentive for farmers with large no-till operations, it  is open to any farmer practicing no-till. There is also an option for farmers to donate their share to the Canadian Food Grains Bank for a tax receipt.

To participate, farmers can register online at http://carbon.norag.ca where, the company website says, registration will take 15 to 20 minutes.

“We’re going to aggregate a whole group of acres,” Currelly says, “have them verified, that generates the credits.” He says the credits are listed and marketed to the highest bidder. The bidding process will be North American wide. BF