Dr Jacqueline Rowarth spoke to The Country's Jamie Mackay about the effect planting trees and organic farming have on greenhouse gas emissions.
New Zealand may be introducing an emissions trading scheme that will include agriculture. Mackay asks if that means "we have to dump sheep, dump cattle, dump deer and grow trees?"
While trees are "lovely" and enhance New Zealand's landscape, to get an economic return out of them they have to be harvested says Dr Rowarth and "the harvesting at the moment is relatively destructive in terms of the environment."
Also in today's interview Dr Rowarth discusses the trade-off between food production and nitrogen fertiliser use.
Listen to the full interview in the Soundcloud embed below:
