Farm Carbon Toolkit

Overview

The Farm Carbon Toolkit (FCT) was created by farmers for farmers. For over a decade, it has worked to further the understanding of greenhouse gas emissions in agriculture, providing tools and services to measure impact and projects that inspire real action on the ground.

FCT is a Community Interest not for profit Company dedicated to supporting the agricultural industry to play its best part in meeting the dual challenges of reversing the decline in nature whilst reducing greenhouse gas emissions to reduce the worst impacts of climate change.

It has a team of 17 agricultural advisors, software experts and scientists, all dedicated to enabling the agriculture and food sectors to meet all the challenges which climate change is bringing.

CEO of the Farm Carbon Toolkit,

Liz Bowles, explains:

Our offer

Our Carbon Calculator is free for farmers to use alongside our online toolkit which provides information on how best to reduce farm business greenhouse gas emissions and build on farm carbon stores. Our calculator also enables users to calculate the impact of practice changes on annual emissions (scenario planning) alongside benchmarking performance with other similar businesses.

We provide advice to individual businesses/ estates and supply chains to enable them to baseline their carbon footprint and develop/ implement emissions reductions plans to enable then to reach net zero.

We implement project activity with partners including Duchy College, Innovation for Agriculture, Royal Countryside Fund and others to support farmers to take action to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and build on farm carbon stores. Activities include workshops, farm walks, on farm research, demonstration farms etc.

We also run two competitions for farmers:

Soil Farmer of the Year – started in 2015
Carbon Farmer of the Year – started in 2023

These competitions aim to increase awareness amongst farmers of the importance of soil health and how to improve soils on farm and, in the case of the carbon farmer competition, to raise awareness of all the ways in which farmers can reduce GHG emissions and build on farm carbon storage.

Soil Farmer Of The Year Winners And Judges 2023

Key challenges

Keeping the farm carbon calculator updated in line with the accelerating research in this area and all new guidance for farm carbon auditing.
Supporting enhanced interoperability with other data sources to reduce multiple data entry for farmers being required.

We have overcome these challenges to date through the current upgrade work we are conducting, supported by Tesco/ WWF and Innovate. We now have an API which is proving very attractive to organisations which would like to be able to offer carbon footprinting to their supply chains.

Key successes

Soil Farmer of the year reaching more farmers every year
Surpassing 7,000 users of our Farm Carbon Calculator
Supporting 45 farmers in Cornwall on their journey to net zero
Developing an International Calculator version for Italy

Key partners involved

Our USP

FCT is an organisation with a commitment to support farmers in a very direct fashion, starting from where farmers are.

Our ambition is to be the most trusted organisation working with the farming sector and beyond on carbon farming and nature-friendly farming. Known for providing clear, independent, and practical advice whilst empowering a thriving food and farming industry.

Our farm Carbon Calculator is recognised as one of the leading industry calculators, trusted by farmers and professionals across the UK and beyond

Top tips

If you have not already done so, carbon footprint your farm now to provide a baseline to measure future emissions reduction actions against.
Baseline farm carbon stocks and identify how best to increase on farm carbon storage
Develop a farm GHG emissions reduction plan taking advice where necessary

Future plans

Development of services to support English farmers to be able to effectively utilise all the support available under SFI and to provide similar support for other parts of the UK as they develop analogous support programmes.

Development of further farm Carbon Calculator International versions in line with demand from overseas.

Provide “train the trainer” type support to farming advisors to upskill more advisors to be able to provide effective advice in the area of emissions reduction and on farm carbon storage within biodiverse, resilient farm businesses.

Support agricultural educational institutions to include effective modules on GHG emissions reduction for farm businesses and provide specialist lectures for undergraduate agricultural students.

Liz says:

"Farm Carbon Toolkit and its farm carbon calculator is trusted by thousands of farmers to support their journey to net zero."

Contact details:

Liz.Bowles@farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk

The Farm Carbon Toolkit