{"id":12911,"date":"2021-06-29T16:51:28","date_gmt":"2021-06-29T20:51:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/?p=12911"},"modified":"2025-05-13T16:53:55","modified_gmt":"2025-05-13T20:53:55","slug":"sustainability-goals-food-companies-slash-methane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/2021\/06\/29\/sustainability-goals-food-companies-slash-methane\/","title":{"rendered":"To meet sustainability goals, food companies need to slash methane"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the recent surge in corporate net zero commitments<\/a>\u00a0suggests, the risks associated with climate change are top of mind for today\u2019s leading businesses and investors.<\/p>\n

For companies that produce, process or sell beef, pork and\/or dairy, there\u2019s an often overlooked, invisible source of climate pollution lurking in the supply chain: methane.<\/p>\n

An extremely potent greenhouse gas, methane has more than\u00a080 times<\/a>\u00a0the warming power of carbon dioxide in the short term. This means cutting methane emissions is one of the fastest ways for businesses to make progress toward their sustainability targets, meet growing stakeholder demands for bold climate action and be more resilient.<\/p>\n

The opportunity for leadership is especially urgent in the livestock sector, which is responsible for\u00a0roughly one-third<\/a>\u00a0of all human-caused methane emissions globally.<\/p>\n

While some food and agricultural companies are making progress on methane, there\u2019s still a long way to go. Here\u2019s what these companies need to know.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Managing methane is good for business<\/strong><\/p>\n

Food and agricultural companies are especially vulnerable to climate change risks, given increases in extreme and volatile weather, which can impact their productivity, as well as their long-term resilience.<\/p>\n

Methane is indirectly affecting agricultural productivity through climate change and\u00a0ozone pollution<\/a>, which is known to harm ecosystems and plants.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, fast and ambitious methane mitigation can help avoid crop losses caused by ozone pollution. For example, a recent\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0indicates that productivity of key commodities increases by 145,000 tons for every 1 million tons of methane reduced.<\/p>\n

Livestock pollution disproportionally impacts communities<\/strong><\/p>\n

In addition to its potent effect on climate, livestock production also has localized impacts \u2014 on water quality, pollution and odor, for example \u2014 that often disproportionally affect low wealth communities and communities of color because of the location of livestock farms.<\/p>\n

Addressing these localized impacts is a business imperative. So, too, is engaging affected local communities, to choose the most appropriate solutions. These solutions include technologies to mitigate the impact of livestock pollution at the local level, which should be used when and where they align with community needs.<\/p>\n

\"Dairy<\/p>\n

Immediate methane reduction is crucial<\/strong><\/p>\n

While the warming impact of methane is concentrated during its first decade or so in the atmosphere, most companies use the warming potential of GHGs over 100 years to compare impacts between different GHGs, called carbon dioxide equivalents.<\/p>\n

When you look at methane over a 100-year period vs. a 20-year period, however, its warming potential drops from 84 times more potent than carbon dioxide\u00a0to just 28. This discounts the critical role that methane plays in the rate of warming today.<\/p>\n

This also gives livestock companies a timely opportunity. They can make faster progress against their corporate climate goals \u2014 including net zero \u2014 by prioritizing early\u00a0action on methane<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That means supporting global methane emission reduction targets in line with what the\u00a0science recommends<\/a>, investing in innovation, and advocating for policies that help livestock farmers reduce methane and other pollution.<\/p>\nWhile some food and agriculture companies are making progress on methane, there\u2019s still a long way to go. Here\u2019s what these companies need to know. <\/a><\/span>Share on X<\/a><\/span>\n

This post originally appeared on the EDF+Business blog<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There’s an often overlooked, invisible source of climate pollution lurking in the supply chain: methane.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3619,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[120554],"tags":[107054,71754,85098,34915],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-12911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-agriculture","tag-climate-mitigation","tag-climate-smart-agriculture","tag-livestock","tag-methane"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3619"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12911"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15621,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12911\/revisions\/15621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12911"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/growingreturns\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=12911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}