Smith carbon project
The Smith Carbon Project is a 500 hectare sheep farming operation with a land management strategy that incorporates multi-species pastures and planned grazing management.
Having purchased the land in mid-2019 during drought conditions, building climate resilience into their land was a key factor in the McInnerney’s decision to initiate a soil carbon farming project.
Additional watering points and fencing were installed to support the subdivision of their land into smaller paddocks and to build water resilience through maintaining groundcover.
Multi-species pasture and rotational grazing have increased the diversity of microbial, insect and bird life on the property, and enabled the landholders to improve carrying capacity.
The project has generated
Project Highlights
Using satellite data to assist in on-farm decision making.
The project is beyond net-zero carbon intensity, sequestering more carbon than it emitted each year.
This project is the third to undergo AgriProve’s carbon intensity assessment which shows landholders when they are successfully sequestering more carbon than they are emitting each year of the project farming operation.
Results
Bellhaven Brook Farm includes 800 Australian White ewes, whose progeny go into direct-to-consumer lamb boxes distributed primarily throughout the Sunshine Coast through the Macintyre Brook Lamb business.
With farm management that incorporates multi-species pastures and rotational grazing, the project is delivering whole of farm benefits through soil carbon sequestration’s ability to build additional layers of profitability into the business.
Sophie McInnerney: “We see starting a soil carbon project as a way of accelerating our positive impact and enhancing our regenerative practices. By planting multispecies crops we gain more opportunities to sequester carbon, and rotational grazing gives our pastures time to rest and recover.
Our climate is becoming harsher and we don’t know if we’ll get spring rainfalls, so maintaining groundcover is important and puts us in a good position to bounce back when it does rain.”
Take a tour of the Smith Carbon Project
AgriProve is the partner of choice for soil carbon projects
““Farmers are part of the climate solution, and most farmers I know are doing the right thing by their country. We’re proud to be leading the way in partnership with AgriProve who’ve made the whole process simple and are always available to answer questions.
If you’ve got a genuine interest in caring for your land and the wider environment then look into starting a soil carbon project. The additional revenue stream it provides allows you to further advance your activities to do right for your land.”
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