At the end of 2008, the East of England Development Agency (EEDA) commissioned the Low Carbon Innovation Centre to produce a report investigating the potential of biochar as a soil improver and aid to regional agriculture.

This review paper by Muller A., published by the Environment for Development Initiative in April 2009 (funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) concludes that organic agriculture, as an adaptation strategy to climate change and variability, is a concrete and promising option for rural communities and has additional potential as a mitigation strategy.

Development of an embedded carbon emissions indicator: Producing a Time Series of Input-Output Tables and Embedded Carbon Dioxide Emissions for the UK by Using a MRIO Data Optimisation System was published by Defra in July 2008. Some of the key findings are as follows: Consumer emissions (CE) are significantly higher than producer emissions (PE) or the UNFCCC national total (in 2004, CE are 132 Mt or 21% higher than PE and over 200 Mt or 37% higher than the national total reported to the UNFCCC, including overseas territories.

This report by the FAO (2009) takes as its starting point that the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report finding that agriculture worldwide emits 5-6 GT CO2 eq a year, equivalent to 10-12% of global GHG emissions (the figure does not include land use change. The IPCC made four key recommendations on how agriculture could mitigate GHG emissions covering the areas of: crop rotations and farming system design; nutrient and manure management; livestock management, pasture and fodder supply improvement;