Green Daily

Over half of New Zealand's greenhouse gases are believed to be emitted by its livestock. Muti-stomached animals like cows, sheep and even deer burp and fart ungodly amounts of methane gas as a byproduct of their digestion. That's why scientists in New Zealand's research facilities have been racing to map the genome that causes livestock to poot greenhouse gases -- with the hope that they can somehow turn off the gas valve genetically.

Now, I'm not sure that I fully believe that 50% of NZ's CO2 comes from animal belches, but even if the figure is as low as 25%, it's still pretty huge. In the past, New Zealand's government has tried to pass a national 'flatulence tax' on the agricultural industry -- but each time it was blocked by some seriously angry farmers. Still, the government claims that 90% of the nation's methane emissions came from it's 45 million sheep and 10 million cows.