Greta Thunberg turns attention to New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions

Greta Thunberg divided Kiwis with her tweet about New Zealand. Photo / Getty Images

Climate activist Greta Thunberg has angered New Zealanders on Twitter with a post about the country's greenhouse gas emissions.

Thunberg shared a Guardian article titled "Emissions from cows on New Zealand dairy farms reach record levels", highlighting a quote that pointed out NZ's emissions

"New Zealand is one of the world's worst performers on emission increases. Its emissions rose by 57 per cent between 1990 and 2018 - the second greatest increase of all industrialised countries," she posted in her tweet.

"New Zealand is one of the world’s worst performers on emission increases. Its emissions rose by 57% between 1990 and 2018 – the second greatest increase of all industrialised countries." writes The Guardian.https://t.co/z8aa58eVul

— Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) August 7, 2021

Her quote is from the Guardian article, which points to official data showing that dairy emissions in New Zealand rose 3.18 per cent in 2019, to a total of 17,719 kilotonnes of carbon dioxide.

Data shows emissions from industry rose 2.5 per cent, while household emissions decreased by 0.3 per cent.

While Thunberg said nothing beyond the quote from the article, many Kiwis took exception to her singling out New Zealand, with people inviting her to come and see "world-leading emissions-efficient practices that feed 40 million people".

You’re welcome to come visit our farmers and their world-leading emissions efficient practices that feed 40m people. Just make sure you leave any alternative energy sources (banned), biotechnologies (banned) or access to international emissions reductions (banned) at the border. https://t.co/05c7pgWga1

— James Meager (@jrmeager) August 8, 2021

NZ accounts for less than one tenth of one percent of global CO2 emissions per year.

Tackle the big polluters first. Even if you get NZ to cut ALL of its emissions, this will cut 0.0009 of global emissions. https://t.co/g0huq54b9v

— 🌽 CORN POP 🌽 (@Fishcak18433002) August 7, 2021

Others argued that the data shows New Zealand does not live up to the clean green image it has overseas.

Meanwhile in "clean green" New Zealand... https://t.co/fxQ1zjSJ8U

— James Gardner (@JEGcomposer) August 7, 2021

We like to think we're pretty great, but we have *so* much work to do. https://t.co/Tyr4PyYnqL

— Mark Stewart (@markboynz) August 7, 2021

called out! https://t.co/lqnLIUF9gA

— Tom Mitchell (@TomMitchell) August 8, 2021

This is a damning article. All of #Aotearoa should be concerned, and it is clear that trying to create new breeds of cows is not the right solution. https://t.co/W8aLwIlyCF

— Tristan Katz (@Tristandkatz) August 8, 2021

Thunberg's tweet about New Zealand has more than 5400 likes and has been retweeted more than 1500 times.