Our story
Farming Carbon is an environmental subscription, enabling businesses & individuals to support the process of measurement & analysis to develop the world's most impactful solution to climate change.
The Met Office documented the hottest September on record here in Northern Ireland. That came after Ballywatticock made headlines hitting 31.2 C in the summer.
Internationally in 2021, we have had record temperatures, cyclones, dust storms, wildfires across Europe & Australia, flooding across Northern Europe. There is no doubt that our weather patterns are changing. Alongside climate concerns, we have been experiencing an increasing uncertainty of the food supply chain across the UK, which led to national chains closing their doors for lack of produce.
Our news threads are full of frightening stories and hopelessness. Yet we have a solution at the tip of our fingers that could prevent the climate crisis from getting worse. Not only do we have a solution, but we want to empower you to be responsible for helping us to implement it.
No doubt we could be protesting, or partaking in activism, throwing seeds at Government buildings in hope that someone might come out and listen to us. Alternatively, we could plant those seeds in a movement much more powerful. So powerful it's the difference between our future fate having food or famine, fear or freedom. The difference between hope or terror for the youth of today who are impacted by "eco-anxiety".
Plant growth is the most available, realistic to implement and completely natural way of addressing the imbalance in our atmosphere of carbon emissions. It is a 100% natural way to increase the chemical breakdown of CO2 through photosynthesis.
Plants are nourished by this process of “digesting” CO2, retaining the carbon in their structure and excreting oxygen as a by-product. Through a stringent method of researching and analysing sustainable farming on our farm, we would be better placed to make recommendations to local authorities and policy-makers to protect biodiversity, soil health and with it our food systems and structures.
Increasing the biomass of plants on the ground encourages deep diverse root networks which support the structure of the soil itself and protect it from erosion during floods. And the continual growth and consumption of the plants themselves mean that the fields are constantly removing CO2 from the air and retaining it in the roots, soil and plants themselves.
What we need is support from our community. Imagine being able to describe to future generations that you were part of the movement that made such an impact on protecting the world they will flourish in. The movement that started in Northern Ireland but was increasingly adopted around the world from the measured research demonstrating its effectiveness. Attending events such as the Planet Mark Zero-Carbon Tour show how far we have come as a small country and how we are adaptive and innovative.
Our advice
Our company founders have been observing innovation in environmentalism for years and while Patrick, the head of Farming for Farming Carbon started to implement practical solutions in the fields and apply the principles of what he was finding out about over the past number of years, I have been up to my knees in research papers and Government proposals.
We both watch documentaries on this topic, which included Kiss the Ground, The Littlest Big Farm, and anything that was playing on National Geographic or Discovery channel in regards to this goal.
I think for anyone who wants to make an impact on their local environment it is a good idea to start interacting with any information in that space. Find books, videos, blogs, and websites that help you to understand what is going on in your chosen spot within society. We would not be where we are now without Patrick having started years ago.
Raising awareness and sharing information and ideas helps stimulate discussion and enthusiasm for action and we enjoyed attending the Planet Mark Zero Carbon event in Belfast earlier this year.
Trial and error and seeing how your idea works are useful in a much more practical sense than my tactic of reading all about it but not physically seeing the process.
What we have now is a healthy balance in our business relationship so this approach has worked for us and we would not look to do things differently.
