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| NVZ - Implications For Farmers | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 December 19 2002 sees the substantial enlargement of the land area in England designated as Nitrate Vulnerable Zones. Following the introduction of NVZs in 1996, when 8 per cent of the country became subject to restrictions in the use of fertilizers and organic manures, the proportion is set to increase to 55 per cent.
Estimates indicate that around 70 per cent of nitrate found in rivers and other surface waters in England comes from agricultural land and the EC Nitrates Directive requires NVZs to be established in catchments where nitrate in water sources exceeds the 50mg/l limit or where the concentration is increasing and could exceed the limit if no action were taken. Provided the economically optimum application rate is not exceeded, fertilizer N should not increase the risk of nitrate leaching, while one of the aims of the NVZ Action Programme is to ensure that nitrogen application matches as closely as possible crop demand. The new Action Programme, to be monitored and policed by the Environment Agency, will dictate what farmers can and cannot do at sensitive times of the year and impose a series of closed periods during which the application of manufactured nitrogen fertilizer, slurry, poultry manures and liquid digested sludge is prohibited on grassland and non-grass or autumn crops (see table). The use of FYM, however, is not affected. In addition, there are provisions to restrict spreading in specific circumstances, such as when soils are waterlogged, where fields slope steeply or are close to watercourses. Far from being new, these measures are already enshrined in the Code of Good Agricultural Practice for the Protection of Water. The scheme also seeks to limit the amount of fertilizer nitrogen applied to that actually required by the crop, taking into account other sources - something which the fertilizer industry has advocated for many years. To this end, farmers will need to keep adequate farm records for at least five years, covering cropping, livestock numbers and the use of nitrogen fertilizers and organic manures. Those using N management tools, such as N Plan, N Tester and N Sensor, will find this task eased considerably. While the majority of farmers within the designated areas are unlikely to have to alter their normal practices, there will be some for whom the closed period for application of fertilizer N will curtail what has become standard procedure on certain autumn-sown crops - oilseed rape, in particular. However, where a valid agronomic requirement can be demonstrated, permission to apply fertilizer N within the prescribed closed period may be sought from the Environment Agency. A further implication awaits farmers who have applied slurry during what is about to become a closed period on soils that are sandy or shallow. The definitions of these soils, for the purposes of NVZ classification, are contained in the relevant Statutory Instrument (No. 1202, 1998). These individuals will be required to ensure that they have adequate storage capacity - conforming to standards set out in the regulations - to cope with the closed period, as will those where the size of the holding is insufficient to absorb the whole farm limits on organic manure N. But while the cost of creating new or enlarged storage capacity will be borne by the farmer, the Environment Agency has indicated that some grant aid may be available for this purpose.
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Source: DEFRA RB209 |