Lincoln University in New Zealand has produced an updated version of the report it published in July 2006.
This compared energy use in the production and transport of a range of agricultural commodities (including lamb, apples and milk) both in the UK and in New Zealand and concluded that for UK consumers, even taking transport into account, it was more energy efficient to consume NZ products.
This latest report looks just at milk and has been updated to include the full range of GHGs (mainly methane and nitrous oxide, in addition to the CO2).
The report finds that the UK production system leads to 34 per cent more emissions per kilogram of milk solids and 30 per cent more per hectare than NZ for dairy production even including the shipping to the UK.
On a per kg milk basis it finds energy use to be higher (ie. CO2), methane to be higher and overall nitrous oxide emissions to be higher. The NZ system is less intensive than the UK one, with a lower proportion of concentrates fed and lower yields per hectare.
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