A FULL professional Carbon Audit of the Northumberland farm that will host North Sheep 2023 shows emissions well below average.

Virgin Money has collaborated with the National Sheep Association (NSA) to run a total carbon audit of the host farm for NSA North Sheep 2023. The Carbon audit was carried out ahead of this year’s event by independent experts, Carbon Metrics, and the results will be discussed in depth in a seminar at the event on June 7th, but headline figures show that the Woodman farms are well ahead of the national agricultural averages: · Current sheep emissions per kg dwt meat produced are 19.25kg/co2e… 30 per cent below the industry average of 32.67kg/co2e. · Current beef emissions per kg dwt beef produced are 34.20kg/co2e. This is below the industry average figure of 40.16kg/co2e · Strengths: Low footprint for sheep; Good footprint for beef; Strong breeding systems; Home grown forage efficiencies; Great soil health · Areas for consideration: Fertiliser usage; Greater use of organic manure; Grazing rotation; Integration of protein into forage; Beef herd genetics; Dietary changes for methane mitigation.

The Woodman family run two farms in south Northumberland totalling 2,150 acres of mixed hill pasture at Great Chesters on Hadrian’s Wall, and lowland grazing and arable land at Bradford House near Ponteland. The two farms carry a suckler herd of 270 cows and a flock of 1,100 sheep. The Woodmans grow all their own silage and hay, and commercial crops of wheat, barley and oil seed at Bradford House.

Simon Haley, Carbon Metrics Director, said: “Overall, the Woodman family’s farms are already well ahead of the national averages in terms of carbon efficiency . The beef enterprise footprint of 34.2kg of CO2e per kg of beef produced places it in the top 50 per cent of producers, and the lamb footprint of 19.25kg of CO2e per kg of deadweight lamb, places the farm just outside the top 25 per cent of producers in the UK.

“From the audit we estimate that both farms sequester annually some 2,226 tonnes of carbon into the soil. This is due to the extensive farming practices for livestock at Great Chester’s and sustainable stocking levels at the Bradford farm.”

Virgin Money’s Head of Agriculture, Brian Richardson, believes the Woodman Carbon Audit will demonstrate how vital this approach is to the future of sustainable farming