wellington new zealand on tuesday unveiled plans to tax the greenhouse gas emissions from farm animals in a controversial proposal designed to tackle climate change pm jacinda ardern said the levy would be the first of its kind in the worldgases naturally emitted by new zealands 62 million cows are among the countrys biggest environmental problems the scheme would see farmers pay for gas emissions from their animals such as methane gas in the farts and burps from cows and nitrous oxide in the urine of livestockardern told farmers they should be able to recoup the cost by charging more for climatefriendly productsshe said the pragmatic proposal would reduce agricultural emissions while making produce more sustainable by enhancing new zealands export brand the government hopes to sign off the proposal by next year and the tax could be introduced in just three years timebut with new zealand going to the polls in the next 15 months the proposal could cost ardern rural votes as farmers condemned the plan andrew hoggard president of the federated farmers lobby group said the scheme would rip the guts out of smalltown new zealand he argued the tax could push farmers into growing trees on fields used to rear livestock