This report from UK charity Rewilding Britain argues that rewilding peatlands, heathland, native woodlands, saltmarshes, wetlands and coastal waters in the UK could sequester carbon and also produce other benefits such as flood mitigation, enhanced biodiversity and water quality improvement.
The report outlines a proposed new subsidy scheme that would incentivise landowners to use rewilding to sequester carbon and restore degraded ecosystems on their land.
The report estimates that spending £1.9 billion to support land-based sequestration could result in 47 million tonnes of CO2 being sequestered each year (more than one tenth of current UK emissions). For context, current agricultural subsidies in the UK under the Common Agricultural Policy cost around £3 billion each year.
Read the full report, Rewilding and climate breakdown: How restoring nature can help decarbonise the UK, here (PDF link). See also the Foodsource building block What is land use and land use change?
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