Tim Wyle, from the West Australian Department of Agriculture and Food, highlighted that despite the drought there are some emerging opportunities available to land managers from a carbon trading scheme.

“While there are challenges for farmers sequestering carbon, we can and must include soil carbon in an emissions trading scheme,” he told the conference session on soils and sustainability.

“By including carbon in an emission trading scheme this will open up opportunities for new funding to flow from the mining industry into agriculture.”

Additional funding in WA is essential to identify farm management techniques that sequester carbon and provide general ecosystems services, but also generate long term viability of farms both financially and environmentally.

Mr Wyle noted that field studies in the far north of WA"s wheat belt show that a hectare of perennial grasses and fodder shrubs can sequester five to seven tonnes of CO2 equivalent per annum.

These carbon sequestration gains translate into a net sequestration of four tonnes of CO2 equivalent per annum at the farm gate, or 20 kilograms of CO2 equivalent for one kilogram of live weight.

Dr Pauline Mele, Principal Research Scientist at the Victorian Department of Primary Industries, gave an insight into a new DNA approach that will provide valuable information on new farming methods to improve soil communities and maintain agricultural productivity.

“Transferring such results into effective policy requires an integrated approach, by scientists and economists, and relies on linking key soil variables to ecosystem services, such as water quality,” she said.