For decades, New Zealand dairy farmers have invested in native bush, riparian planting, shelterbelts, and other forms of vegetation that deliver environmental benefits far beyond the farm gate. Yet despite these efforts, there has been no practical, scalable way to accurately measure and recognise the carbon being sequestered across thousands of farms. Fonterra’s award-winning Counting Carbon project set out to change that.

Developed in partnership with Prism Earth and GPSit, the initiative created a world-first carbon removals programme that enables dairy farmers to view, verify and declare vegetation on their farms through a simple digital experience. The programme combines remote sensing, machine learning, carbon accounting methodologies and farmer-centred design to transform complex environmental data into an accessible and valuable tool for both farmers and the Co-operative.

Fonterra has committed to achieving a 30% emissions intensity reduction by 2030, with a portion of that expected to come from carbon removals.

However, achieving this goal required solving a significant data challenge. Existing vegetation datasets were often outdated, incomplete and too coarse to support accurate farm-level carbon accounting. Farmers had limited visibility of how their plantings contributed to carbon sequestration, and there was no scalable system that allowed those benefits to be reflected in farm, Co-op and product footprints.

The project team identified three critical objectives:

• Map and measure carbon removals at scale with high accuracy and cost efficiency.
• Develop a robust and auditable carbon removals framework.
• Deliver a simple digital experience that farmers could complete quickly and confidently.

The Counting Carbon programme combines several technologies and processes into a single integrated platform. Using advanced remote sensing and machine learning, vegetation across more than 8,000 dairy farms was identified, mapped and classified. This provided a detailed understanding of vegetation assets across the Co-op and established the foundation for carbon accounting at an unprecedented scale.

The team then developed a carbon removals framework that could accurately assess sequestration potential while meeting assurance and reporting requirements. To bring the data to life, a farmer-focused digital experience was created. Farmers can log in, review pre-populated vegetation maps, confirm or update information, and complete a declaration in just a few minutes. The process was extensively tested and refined with farmers ensuring the final solution was intuitive and practical.

One of the project’s biggest achievements has been its ability to remove complexity for farmers. Carbon removals accounting is often viewed as highly technical, with evolving regulations, eligibility rules and uncertainty around long-term value. Counting Carbon shields farmers from much of this complexity while still giving them ownership and control over their information. The response from farmers has been overwhelmingly positive with high rates of adoption.

Michelle Good, General Manager Farm Performance at Fonterra explains “The scale of impact generated by the programme has been substantial with the project giving us a highly verifiable carbon removals inventory which we can use in our emissions reduction targets. This creates benefits at multiple levels including farmers gaining recognition for carbon sequestration occurring on their properties and Fonterra strengthening progress toward our 2030 climate goals, she goes on to say.

While the initial focus was carbon removals, the value of the programme extends well beyond emissions reporting. The vegetation dataset created through Counting Carbon is now being used to support initiatives relating to biodiversity, nature-based outcomes, targeted planting programmes and sustainable dairy growth.

Counting Carbon received the Innovation award at Fonterra’s Te Mātāpuna awards which celebrates exceptional impact for the Co-op, farmer shareholders, and customers while demonstrating Fonterra’s values.