Vets have a 'critical role' to play in reducing emissions from agriculture, director of Teagasc Frank O'Mara told a Veterinary Council of Ireland conference on Wednesday 25 October.

Animal health is a key driver of efficiency and productivity on farms, he said, while stressing the importance of replacement rates and age at first calving in sucklers.

"If you take a dairy herd of 100 cows, the more replacements you have to carry in that herd, there'll be more emissions associated with that farm. If you can get away with 20 versus having to carry 30, that's 10 extra animals that are emitting.

"In terms of age at first calving, most of our sucklers calve at three years of age. There is no reason they can't calve at two years of age, because for that extra year, they are just passengers," he stressed.

Reducing age of finish, making EBI improvements, feed additives and reducing crude protein content in meal are areas which are animal health related and vets can guide farmers on those, O'Mara said.

In terms of fertiliser use, O'Mara said that it was "heartening" to see protected urea usage increase in 2022.

In 2022, protected urea usage increased to 9.1% from 5.1% the year previous.

"This year, I'd imagine it has gone higher again, but we need to get that figure to 90% by 2030. From a standing start, it's reasonably good progress.

"Our target for 2030 is to reduce [chemical nitrogen] by 30%. In 2022, it went down by about 15% or 16%, and in 2023, we know it's gone down by another 14%.

"We are actually at the level now of nitrogen fertiliser use that we need to get to in order to reach the targets in our MACC Curve," he said.