Should organic farmers be rewarded for sequestering C in soil?

Summary

The question of whether farmers, and organic farmers in particular, should be rewarded for sequestering C in soils is controversial. A review of the literature on long term experiments comparing organic and conventional systems, demonstrates that soils under organic management tend to have higher soil organic carbon (SOC) contents than conventionally managed soils. But the logistics of designing a system that compensates individual farmers for this ecosystem service are challenging. Agreements would have to be reached on the baseline system used for calculation of relative gains in SOC, values for emissions of other GHGs from soils (e.g. methane and nitrous oxide), the direct and indirect CO2 emissions associated with energy use and crop production inputs in the C sequestering system, and emissions associated with sources of SOC imported onto the farm. Alternatively, the evidence for generally higher SOC under organic management could justify an additional payment, for example under the UK Government’s Organic Entry Level Scheme.