Center will help cut CO2 emissions from farming

New standards and technologies to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by farming will be adopted with the launch yesterday in Beijing of the Center for Research on Agriculture and Climate Change.

Jointly established by the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS) and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), a US-based nongovernmental organization, the center will publish a Chinese version of the Duke Standard - a US guide to verifiable and measurable methods for reducing, avoiding and storing GHGs produced by agriculture.

The EDF has already run pilot schemes based on the standard in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. These included promoting non-till farming technology, adopting drip irrigation, turning biogas into fuel and planting tamarisk - a shrub that is good at slowing sand movement.