The Alliance Party’s 2022 Assembly election manifesto claims: “Addressing our agriculture and transport sectors is fundamental to drastically reducing emissions in Northern Ireland. Nearly 30% of Northern Ireland’s greenhouse gas emissions are from agriculture, compared to 10% in the rest of the UK. This reflects the importance of agriculture to our economy, as well as our larger livestock base.”

This is correct, more or less.

Stats

Official figures from the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) state that agriculture makes up a 26% share of NI’s total greenhouse gas emissions. They project that, by 2030, that figure will be 31%. 

The UK’s Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs Agri-climate report 2021 confirms that 10% of total greenhouse gas emissions in the UK come from agriculture.

Northern Ireland Greenhouse Gas Projections Report (2019)

Does 26% count as “nearly 30%”? It could be closer, but it’s hardly an outrageous thing to say.

However, there is another caveat worth noting.

New measures

A representative from the Statistics and Analytical Services Branch at DAERA told FactCheckNI: “We will be updating the NI greenhouse gas inventory in early June.  This will cover the period 1990 – 2020.”

Once updated, the previous statistics become redundant and cannot be used for comparison purposes due to methodological improvements and new data.

The new data scheduled for June may put this claim in a different context.