3 billion kilos less milk is not a foregone conclusion

He said this in response to questions during a meeting of the European dairy umbrella organization EDA. The above figure has been regularly mentioned in recent years as a result of a reduction in the livestock population. According to Van Karnebeek, the fixation on reducing the number of cows and a resulting reduction in milk production is unjustified.

Still game on the wagon
He sees an opportunity for a different course. “That game is still very much on the wagon,” he said. As far as he is concerned, it should not be about animal numbers at all. It is about reducing the environmental footprint of dairy farming, and according to him there is still a lot of room for technical improvements in that area. Van Karnebeek wants to focus more strongly on this.

"Of course we have an emergency scenario ready, in case things have to be done differently. And our farmers are not obsessed with volume. After all, it is about their income," says Van Karnebeek. Still, he would like to maintain the milk production volume.

carbon credits
While top managers of many other dairy companies complain about the enormous sustainability pressure placed on livestock farming, Van Karnebeek sounds more optimistic. "Our customers see value in sustainability. They are also willing to pay for it." Dairy farmers benefit from this. There is also value for them in capturing CO2 through carbon credits, but he believes it is important that these carbon credits remain within agriculture, otherwise the sector will shoot itself in the foot. The market for carbon credits is also still in its infancy and improvement is needed. He thinks it is unfair if such rights go to oil companies, for example, as is currently happening. According to him, marketability within agriculture is not a problem.

Arla's COO, Peter Giörtz-Carlson, also believes that more technical measures are possible to limit agricultural emissions with the help of technical measures, and substantiated with data from the farm.

Strategic dialogue
According to him, the way forward is that of maximum nutrition against minimum emissions. According to Giörtz-Carlson, the dairy has been working hard on this for a long time, but politicians and activists do not want to listen to it, he complains.

Many parties from agriculture and dairy hope that, now that Frans Tiimmermans has left as European Commissioner for the 'Green Deal' and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is calling for a 'strategic dialogue' with agriculture, things will slowly start to change. the Brussels political climate.