Windbreak

HECS for farmers? Nature repair loans could help biodiversity recover – and boost farm productivity

Retrieved on: 
Tuesday, May 9, 2023

That’s one reason why the Australian government is looking to alternatives such as a nature repair market.

Key Points: 
  • That’s one reason why the Australian government is looking to alternatives such as a nature repair market.
  • This, the government hopes, would boost biodiversity – especially on private land such as farms.
  • To make this market work, the government might consider creating a new version of Australia’s well-known HECS higher education loans.
  • This work will boost farm productivity and biodiversity with farmers repaying the loan when their revenues permit.

Why is this needed?

    • To prevent further extinctions, the government announced it would introduce a new nature repair market.
    • This market could, if done well, tackle some of the drivers of biodiversity loss and land degradation – particularly on our farmland.
    • Protecting habitat and waterways, preventing erosion and improving drought resilience would all be eligible.
    • Read more:
      We must look past short-term drought solutions and improve the land itself

      But farmers can make this money back.

How would this work with the nature repair scheme?

    • The federal government has pitched its planned nature repair market as an offset scheme: farmers and landholders do repair work and get biodiversity certificates which can be bought by, say, another farmer wanting to clear land.
    • All farms experience large swings in annual revenues from forces outside a farmer’s control, such as rain, drought, floods and commodity price shocks.
    • The best financial tool to help farmers undertake nature repair is the type which smooths their income.
    • If these loans were added to our nature market, it could get much more traction than a grant scheme.

What about the transparency problem?

    • To avoid this, projects tied to a FECS loan would have ensure plantings, shelterbelts and dam renovations are effective and meet standards.
    • We could borrow from decades of monitoring hundreds of sustainable farms in endangered temperate woodlands to create robust standards.
    • As we wrestle with the best way forward for Australia’s first nature repair market, we should seriously consider rolling out revenue-dependent loans for farmers.
    • He is a member of Birds Australia that seeks to boost bird conservation outcomes on farms

EOS Data Analytics And Epik Systems Announce Partnership

Retrieved on: 
Wednesday, December 1, 2021

SAN DIEGO, Dec. 1, 2021 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- EOS Data Analytics (EOSDA) , a global provider of AI-powered satellite imagery analytics, has entered into a strategic partnership with Epik Systems (Epik) , the San Diego-based developer of SocratesAg, a mobile-centric Farm and Carbon Management Platform (FCMS) that enables efficient operation and sustainability of small-scale farms.

Key Points: 
  • SAN DIEGO, Dec. 1, 2021 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- EOS Data Analytics (EOSDA) , a global provider of AI-powered satellite imagery analytics, has entered into a strategic partnership with Epik Systems (Epik) , the San Diego-based developer of SocratesAg, a mobile-centric Farm and Carbon Management Platform (FCMS) that enables efficient operation and sustainability of small-scale farms.
  • "EOS Data Analytics is delighted to announce the partnership with Epik Systems to contribute to the AgriTech market growing in the US and Mexico.
  • EOSDA platforms are supporting precision agriculture, and now, together with Epik Systems, we are also able to play a key role in farm-level carbon management," says Rim Elijah, VP of Sales at EOS Data Analytics.
  • Contact information for media outlets:
    EOS Data Analytics (EOSDA) is a trusted global provider of AI-powered satellite imagery analytics.