Okay. I will start rolling through, and then I'll let Fawn jump in if she wants to.
Good afternoon. Thanks for the opportunity to appear before you today. I'm Reynold, the science director with the beef cattle research council. My silent collaborator is Fawn Jackson, who is the director of policy with the Canadian Cattlemen's Association.
The CCA represents 60,000 beef producers in Canada. The beef industry contributes $21.8 billion to Canada's GDP and supports 348,000 full-time jobs. Fifty per cent of Canada's beef is exported around the globe.
The beef industry is a hidden gem when it comes to Canada's environment. Beef production is one of the best tools Canada has to reach our shared conservation and climate change goals. When we talk about net-zero emissions, it's important to recognize where beef production fits into Canada's climate change picture. The emission intensity of Canadian beef is about half the global average, and we're continuing to improve. Our per-kilogram greenhouse gas footprint dropped by 15% between 1981 and 2011. That happened because Canada is a world leader in research and because Canada's farmers and ranchers are adopting the improved animal and plant health, nutrition and genetics practices and technologies that research generates.
Reducing consumption of Canadian beef would be detrimental to Canada's net-zero emissions goals, and here's why. Beef contributes 2.4% to Canada's total emissions, but emissions are only one side of the carbon ledger. The other side of the ledger is the soil carbon that's stored in grasslands. Canada's ranchers steward 44 million acres of grasslands, which are a stable store of 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon. Reducing beef production and consumption would mean that privately owned grasslands would be converted to other agricultural uses. Cultivating Canada's remaining grasslands would release much more soil carbon into the atmosphere than we would ever save from reduced cattle emissions. This risk is real. Canada lost five million acres of grasslands in the early 2000s when beef producers faced tough economic times.
To further improve the net greenhouse gas footprint of Canadian beef, we need to tackle three key challenges. The first is to further reduce our emissions per kilogram of Canadian beef. Our industry's goal is to reduce Canadian beef emissions intensity by another 33% by 2030. Achieving this will require continued advancements in genetics, animal health management and nutrition. Canadian researchers are also investigating nutritional supplements for cattle that could significantly accelerate those improvements.
The second challenge is to further increase carbon sequestration on grasslands. Our industry's goal is to sequester an additional 3.4 million tonnes of carbon every year. This will require research to develop more productive plant varieties and to identify forage and grazing management practices that increase productivity and carbon sequestration. We will also need to support producer adoption of these beneficial practices.
The third challenge is to protect the large and stable store of carbon in Canada's grasslands. Canada's beef industry has a goal to maintain and protect the 44 million acres of grasslands that are under our care. We've already lost 80% of our natural grasslands. The World Wildlife Fund's “2020 Plowprint Report” found that the great plains are continuing to be lost at a rate of four football fields every minute. We're working very closely and collaboratively with the conservation organizations and the Canadian round table for sustainable beef to protect these grasslands.
We worry that these efforts will not be enough. The biggest unknown is how a myriad of government policies such as offset protocols, clean fuel regulations and significant investments in irrigation will drive land use change, on top of record high crop prices. We need thoughtful deliberation to avoid policies that drive irreparable damage to this grassland ecosystem and its significant carbon stores.
We give this detail on Canada's beef industry because it emphasizes why, in regard to Bill C-12, our key ask is that holistic policy analysis be done to understand the potential unintended negative consequences of well-intended environmental policies. We also ask that experts from Canada's beef industry be included in advisory roles under the act to ensure that the best analyses and policies to support net-zero emissions are developed.
We look forward to being partners in this work towards net-zero emissions in Canada.
Thank you for your time.