Synergies between conventional soil organic carbon, farm productivity, soil sequestration and soil carbon market risk in Australia

McHenry, M.P. (2009) Synergies between conventional soil organic carbon, farm productivity, soil sequestration and soil carbon market risk in Australia. In: Nardali, E.T., (ed.) No-till farming: Effects on soil, pros and cons, and potential. Nova Science Publishers, Hauppauge, New York, pp. 93-110.

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Abstract

The investment risk of sequestering carbon as soil organic carbon (SOC) is low when compared to the susceptibility of forestry sequestration projects to disease, bushfires and droughts over a 100-year investment timeframe. As it can require decades to create a substantial carbon market asset with the slow natural accrual rates of carbon in soils, farmers will require short-term benefits to their conventional productivity from SOC additions. This chapter explores the additional effects of improving farm SOC levels on conventional farm productivity, soil nutrition, crop yields, soil water use efficiency, crop stability, disease resistance, soil biodiversity and tillage. This work also collates a broad range of management options available to farmers for utilising SOC to assist current productivity, while clarifying the risks and uncertainties of soil carbon stock fluxes, carbon markets and carbon emission policy developments in Australia.