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Greenhouse Gas Reduction Management and Food Safety are Simultaneously Ensured as Taiwan’s Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Emission is Gradually Reduced Every Year
In order to manage the reduction of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and ensure the food safety, Taiwan has continued to promote political strategies such as organic agriculture, environment-friendly cultivation, rational fertilization, and increasing efficiencies of livestock wasterwater treatment with the objective of reducing GHGs emitted by agricultural productions. The Council of Agriculture (COA) has adopted the international standard to estimate the domestic emission. In 2014, the agricultural GHGs emission only took up 1.95% of overall emission in Taiwan, which comes with a reduction of 24% when compared to the emission of 7.274 million metric tons (in CO2 eq.) in 2005.
The COA indicates that agricultural activities physically generate GHGs. Since 1990, according to historical data, agricultural GHGs emission who gradually reduced every year. One of the main reasons is Taiwan's accessing to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Because of trade liberalization, domestic agricultural production has been impacted and resulted in scaled down cultivated areas as well as livestock and poultry breeding. In addition, the promotion and implementation of environment-friendly strategies have been beneficial on GHGs emission reduction.
Since the international communities increasingly emphasize on environmental issues, how to achieve agricultural development while protecting the ecological environment has become an important topic. In accordance to the regulations of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the 2015 Paris Agreement, and the GHGs Reduction and Management Act, the COA has collaborated with the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) to compile the 2016 National Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventory Report, which would serve as the basis for GHGs management.
Based on the 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National GHGs Inventories published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the COA used relevant agricultural statistic data as basis and adopted domestic emission parameters to estimate the GHGs emission and carbon sink in agricultural and forestry sectors. As a result, 5.537 million metric tons (in CO2 eq.) were estimated from CO2, methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O) in 2014, which is decreased of 24% compared to the emissions of 7.274 million metric tons (in CO2 eq.) in 2005. Whereas, the overall CO2 absorption of forestry sector is 21.477 million metric tons (in CO2 eq.) which is increased by 4% compared to the absorption in 2005.
