Understanding the Social Licence of Carbon Farming in the Australian Rangelands

Alex Baumber, Rebecca Cross, Cathy Waters, Graciela Metternicht and Hermann Kam
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Alex Baumber: TD School, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia
Rebecca Cross: School of Geosciences, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2050, Australia
Cathy Waters: NSW Department of Primary Industries, Dubbo, NSW 2830, Australia
Graciela Metternicht: School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, PANGEA Research Centre, UNSW Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia
Hermann Kam: Faculty of Natural Sciences, Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, London SW7 2BX, UK

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: Carbon farming has expanded in Australia’s rangelands over recent years, incentivised under the Australian Government’s Emissions Reduction Fund. While this has largely been driven by economic benefits for landholders, the long-term viability of the carbon farming industry depends on its ability to obtain and maintain a social licence to operate in affected communities. Using a combination of survey, interview and focus group methods, involving key stakeholders in far-western New South Wales (NSW), this study reveals that the greatest threat to the social licence of carbon farming is the lack of confidence in governance related to policy complexity and uncertainty. Procedural fairness is a relative strength because of the involvement of trusted community members, and the trust-building strategies employed by the aggregators who recruit landholders to carbon farming. Perceptions of distributional fairness are strengthened by the benefits beginning to flow through rangeland communities, but are weakened by concerns around the equity of eligibility and the land management rules. A focus on participatory policy development, aligning rules with local values and local-scale trust building, is required in order to enhance the social licence for carbon farming in the NSW rangelands.

Keywords: carbon farming; sequestration; trust; equity; SLO; rangelands (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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