TALKING POINT
TALKING POINT
If you survived BSE
and endured F&M,
take a deep breath.
The initials NVZ will
bring the most
damaging farming
blight yet, says
Nick Adames
Six years ago we were faced with new BSE rules which threatened to relegate 68 of our 120 cows to the incinerator. Classed as cohorts, they were deemed by the experts to be unsafe and had been offered up, along with another 130,000 others, for sacrifice on the EU table.
Due to my stubborn persistence over the following 18 months, including a refusal to answer MAFF letters, or return calls and cancelling all appointments, the ministry lost interest. I found a way out.
The cows were not at risk I told the MAFF officials. In fact as first and second calvers they were the best group in the herd. Although a couple had been struck down earlier, I was determined to fight for them, and their old family bloodlines. Eventually MAFF devised a convoluted justification for their reprieve; the absurdity of which we still laugh about today.
Recently, after seven lactations, the last of these 68 cows had to be put down. There was not a sign of BSE in her or the other 67, which had been moved on over the past six years.
Now we face an even greater risk to our herds future. That risk is soon to be shared by almost every herd in the country. It is called nitrate vulnerable zones. They are even more dangerous and expensive when your land runs close to ditches, steep banks, shallow soil or a national park.
NVZs effectively block the natural discharge from a cows back-end. Although not affecting the cow directly, it is the removal of the discharge, the seasonal restrictions, and the cost of that removal from the farmstead which will be fatal to us and our animals.
For years we have been told to stop relying on artificial inputs and to return to the ways our fathers farmed. Plough back the humus and become organic farmers to see the promised land, we were told. So many followed the advice. And many will regret it.
On our farm we have always put all the muck and slurry back into the soil, either onto grass in February, or ploughed back in the autumn for the coming season. And we have incorporated its use with modern methods of cropping which are non organic.
But due to the new NVZ threat this old practice is now to be banned. During September to November muck and effluent is now deemed a danger to ground water. That is because it risks pushing nitrate water levels above an arbitrary level of 50 parts per million.
Modern diagnostic techniques are very accurate; unfortunately the same equipment was unavailable 1000 or 1000 years ago when nitrate levels from natural sources would have been higher.
Sadly, we cant argue with the experts because they are beholden to EU law. It is unelected commissioners (failed politicians) in Brussels who decide our fate. The 50ppm is not negotiable.
So what BSE couldnt do, NVZs will achieve. Those who NVZs dont kill directly will succumb to the associated paperwork. The only thing left to most of us small family farmers will be to find another job. Something simple, not needing too much qualification. Perhaps become a Member of Parliament?
Meanwhile, I am starting to rue my stubbornness over protecting my old cohorts those years ago. If I had let them go I would have given up stock farming. How much better than suffering these past six years; and still having this next headache to look forward to?
Have a nice day.
• Nick Adames family has been farming in the same area in Sussex for over 340 years. The business consists of two farms; an intensive coastal youngstock rearing unit, and a downland farm with a 150-strong British Friesian dairy herd.