Debate by Mikael Skou Andersen, professor Department of Environmental Science AAU, and Christian Ege, senior consultant at the Green Transition Denmark.

It is gratifying that broader political support is emerging for a general tax on greenhouse gas emissions to also include agriculture - and fortunately the general election has not changed that.

Agriculture currently accounts for 35% of the total emissions in Denmark, and if agriculture does not start with reductions, it will be 45% in 2030. It is calculated that it will be very expensive for society if others have to take the reductions , which agriculture should have taken to reach the 70% target in 2030.

Political support
The Social Democrats clearly say today that agriculture must be included in the tax - just as the supporting parties have been saying for a long time. The Liberal Party's Jakob Ellemann-Jensen now also says so - but only if it does not cost jobs in agriculture and the food industry. But what does this mean?

The food sector's trade union, NNF, says they can accept that part of the climate-damaging jobs disappear and that they can be replaced by greener jobs, for example within plant-based foods.

The Social Democrats say that a tax should only encourage agriculture to adopt more climate-friendly technologies, but should not influence the population's choice of food. But if we are to achieve the reductions, the tax must do both.

It may be a good idea to send the income from the tax back to agriculture, but it must be done in a way that promotes more climate-friendly production, including the development of more plant-based foods. If we support the most climate-damaging foods as much as the climate-friendly ones, we will get nowhere.

Søren Gade from Venstre does not want a Danish tax at all, but wait for a common tax in the EU. But the reality is that the EU is paralyzed here because the treaty says that taxes can only be adopted by unanimity, while all trade rules are adopted by majority vote.

Therefore, the only option is to make a Danish tax. But the other countries also have to live up to the Paris Agreement, including the EU's binding target of a 55% reduction in 2030, so they can't just coast along.

The technologies of the future change taxation
However, we fully agree that a Danish tax on the emission of greenhouse gases will only affect Danish production, but exempt imported goods. It does not help the climate if consumers simply buy imported meat instead. But this can also be solved. You can start by adding the tax to the product itself, for example beef, which is clearly the biggest culprit and where imports are significant. It then applies equally to imported and Danish-produced meat, thus complying with the EU rules on non-discrimination.

However, in the long term it would be a bad idea to put the entire tax here. A tax on emissions has the advantage that it encourages the individual producer to use the most climate-friendly technologies.

When the Danish farmers are better equipped with green technologies in a few years, we can switch to an emissions tax. By that time (by 2030 at the latest) there will also be data which makes it possible to estimate – and charge – the associated emissions in the countries we import from. It can, for example, happen according to the principles outlined in the EU proposal for a climate tariff (CBAM).

In advance, the economic sages have calculated that the so-called leakage of jobs will only be approx. 1/3 – meaning that 1/3 of the most climate-damaging workplaces will move abroad. They must then be replaced by more climate-friendly production in Denmark – for example, plant-based foods.

If there are parties nervous about this, this effect can be greatly reduced by doing as suggested above. At the same time, we will then influence consumption in a more climate-friendly direction, but in a way that puts Danish and imported goods on an equal footing. And then we are down to a leakage effect that we can certainly handle.

In other words, there are no excuses for exempting agriculture from the tax on greenhouse gases.

The debate entry was also brought to the Alting on 15 November. 2022