Water quality and supply: Striking the right balance on farm

Climate change and weather volatility pose major concerns for UK agriculture.

In the past year alone, the UK experienced exceptionally heavy rainfall during the winter months, followed by one of the hottest and driest summers on record.

The former resulted in extensive flooding across large swathes of the UK, especially in eastern counties such as Lincolnshire, calling into question the role of internal drainage boards.

See also: Water abstraction restrictions start in Scotland

Meanwhile, the extremely dry weather in the spring and summer stunted grass growth and crop development, with harvest yields and quality suffering as a result.

With pressure mounting on the agriculture sector, the NFU hosted a water summit in Yorkshire, bringing together delegates from across the food and farming sector along with environmental groups and politicians.

Water quality

The area of perhaps greatest concern for the farming sector is water quality, with government figures showing that agriculture is one of the major sources of water pollution.

At the summit, then Defra secretary Steve Reed said agriculture accounted for about 40% of water pollution, and that targets had been set to reduce the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus entering waterways.

One of the ways the government hopes to achieve this is by introducing new actions through the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) linked to improving water quality.

Mr Reed said: “We are looking at how we can reform the SFI, so when it reopens in the new year there will be more actions focused on cleaning up water.

“It is in the interests of the country as a whole and also in the interests of the farming sector.”

Further details on these actions are expected from Defra this autumn, with farming groups already urging greater clarity on the issue.

NFU vice-president Rachel Hallos who hosted the summit on her farm near Ripponden, West Yorkshire, told Farmers Weekly that the announcement was somewhat unexpected and suggested Defra appeared to be shifting towards a more structured and targeted approach to the SFI.

“I think ultimately, we need to know what that means across all the different sectors,” she said.

“This is a big move away from what we have been used to. We need to ensure that any targeted approach does work and make sure this isn’t just doing an action for the sake of it and it is actually going to deliver on the water quality issue.”

The NFU has called for the new SFI standards to incorporate manure nutrient testing and soil analysis on farms, aligning with the requirements set out in the Farming Rules for Water.

On-farm inspections

As part of efforts to tackle water quality issues in England, Defra and its arm’s-length bodies have strengthened legislation and announced an increase in on-farm inspections, especially for the dairy sector.

Environment Agency (EA) farm inspections are set to increase by about 50%, with 6,000 inspections a year planned by 2029.

EA chief executive Philip Duffy said: “Many farmers share our desire for cleaner waterways and are already taking significant steps to reduce pollution and improve their environmental standards, and this increased support will help even more to do the same.

“Our approach means farmers receive clear advice and practical steps, but where necessary we can and will take enforcement action.”

In the 2024-25 financial year, the EA carried out 4,545 on-farm inspections, with 49% revealing at least one non-compliance. As a result, 6,870 improvement actions were issued.

The NFU supports proportionate regulation to uphold environmental standards, but calls for inspections to be advice-based and act as a learning experience to help farms improve, rather than just enforcement.

Ms Hallos said: “When it comes to water quality, everybody has to own it. We need to make sure this is genuinely advice-led and the right knowledge is being used and shared with farmers, and we have robust data to formulate plans.

“Every single farm and sector is different, so one size does not fit all, but it’s about having the confidence in the data and testing.”

Ms Hallos added that the NFU’s role was to help farmers understand the inspections and ensure that the EA is working on a collaborative model with farmers.

“It’s about best practice, what can you do, what can you change, how do you get your farm into a situation where you can actually comply with what you need to comply with,” she said.

Planning constraints

More than 1,000 of the EA improvement actions last year related to manure and slurry management on farms.

However, many farm businesses have faced challenges in obtaining planning permission to increase slurry storage.

Ms Hallos said: “The lack of joined-up thinking of the past has got to stop, because if you are going to do one action you have got to ensure that another action can happen. You can’t just do one bit.”

Mr Reed acknowledged that the planning system has created a barrier for progress and pledged to ease the planning process.

He said: “We need to make sure that planning moves faster. Planning has been far too slow.

“Farmers can’t get on and build the on-farm reservoirs or structures that they need to support food production.”

Following the announcement, Ms Hallos expressed hope that this would be the logical outcome.

“To me, it is an absolute no-brainer to enable farmers to build reservoirs on farm to collect water during times of high rainfall, and winter.

“This means when it comes to the summer, they have access to that water.”

She suggested that a lot of abstraction issues could be resolved if farmers were given the right to build on-farm reservoirs and access funding to do so.

Water supply

Extreme weather events, such as flooding and droughts, appear to have become more commonplace in the UK in recent years.

This has significantly affected a range of agricultural sectors, with crops failing in waterlogged fields last autumn, and forage shortages hitting livestock farms in recent months.

The government, in partnership with water companies, has secured £104bn of investment to be delivered over a five-year period starting in April 2025.

Mr Reed confirmed that a portion of this investment would be ringfenced to help fund the building of new reservoirs.

“We haven’t built [a reservoir] in this country for 30 years and we have plans to build nine, and we are trying to speed up the planning process to enable that to happen faster.”

Investment and maintenance of national water infrastructure would be crucial in limiting future flooding, according to the NFU.

Ms Hallos said: “It is also about enabling farmers to deliver on their riparian rights without fear of getting it wrong.

“Ensuring that farmers can get the right permits easily and quickly to be able to do their own water management on their farm.”

She concluded that when using fields as floodplains in extreme circumstances, it should be done on a fair basis and landowners should be informed ahead of any decision.

Following the Independent Water Commission report, chaired by Sir John Cunliffe, Defra is exploring a regional planning model to manage pollution across whole-river catchment areas.

Mr Reed said that this approach would help manage all the inputs into a river basin so water can be cleaned up faster.