Two new carbon-based premium payments are now being offered to tillage farmers in continental Europe, farmers at the Seedtech open day in Ballymountain were told by soil specialist Neil Fuller from Atlas Biosystems.

In the past fortnight, a carbon payment of €30/t was announced on top of a malting premium, while another contract is offering €60/t for low carbon barley. One of these payments is believed to be from Heineken.

Fuller said that by the time this falls back onto the consumer, it equates to “a tiny bit of 1c per pint to change that recommended retail price”.

He explained that, depending on efficiencies, 20-25% of the carbon footprint of the retail beer relates to barley and how it was grown.

The majority of the value proposition to buy the drink is from the barley, which affects the drink’s taste and colour.

He added that some carbon rewards programmes pay farmers for reducing their carbon emissions from their baseline level, but may take away money if the crop’s emissions increase.

Some programmes don’t have direct payments, but instead cover the cost of soil sampling or crop seeds.

However, it should be noted that reducing the emissions of the barley often helps to reduce the malting’s or brewery’s emissions.