Members and supporters of Climate Justice Taranaki will be protesting in and around Kapuni tomorrow where the connection between oil and gas drilling and the intensification of dairy farming are obvious.

The earth protectors aim to disrupt business as usual at these three factories for two reasons:
1. to object to the new oil and gas block offers announced last week. All new permits must be halted until the climate crisis is averted. It is completely irresponsible to keep extracting more and more fossil fuels. Until this happens there is little incentive for a true transition away from fossil fuels.
2. to raise awareness of the massive dependence of intensive dairy farming on fossil fuels for fertiliser, machinery, transport, processing and packaging. The government is about to announce a new proposal under its new Carbon Zero Bill which looks likely to treat farming differently and "reduce" its greenhouse gas emission targets but not bring them down to zero. We say this is not good enough. Fonterra exports 95% of its product, farms are billions of dollars in debt and the next generation of farmers are not coming through due to the current poor job conditions. We need triple-bottom-line sustainable farming now.

"As we urgently try to create a pathway to a zero-carbon economy, big business and government plan to pretend intensive dairy farming is barely linked to the fossil fuel industry and give them special treatment once again. The current proposal that methane emissions from the dairy industry don't need to achieve net zero by 2050 is not compatible with the immediate need to sort the climate crisis" says Emily Bailey, a spokesperson for Climate Justice Taranaki.

"In Kapuni, in South Taranaki, you can see all the necessary ingredients for a climate crisis: the oil and gas industry, the urea plant and lactose processing plant side by side in the midst of intensive dairy land. One industry feeding the next. And Fonterra's gas-powered Whareroa dairy factory and the massive Kupe oil and gas plant are also just down the road."

"The old "Think Big" approach is a social, environmental and economic disaster. The great forests that were once a carbon sink have been destroyed and cows are emitting tonnes of methane into the atmosphere... and it's all made possible because of oil and gas. We need to see the big picture and think of the planet. Todd, Ballance and Fonterra - our kids deserve a decent future. This generation needs to lock the gates of climate disruptors and demand a halt to fossil fuel extraction. We want real sustainable farming now" concludes Emily Bailey.

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