Karen Walsh: Polluter pays is principle in environmental protection
Farming and the environment is an intense symbiosis.
One cannot survive without the other, and they work together for the benefit of both — or at least they should.
Farming around the world has long been criticised for causing a great deal of pollution to rivers, lakes, and the air in general.
Farmers are directly dependent financially on the soil beneath them.
It is therefore vital that they protect it.
A deep-rooted concept in successful farming is to put back into the soil what you take out.
This is important, to reduce the amounts of damage being caused to the soil.
In some cases, the risks to the environment can be seen as necessary in order to encourage successful farming.
At the same time, the equitable (fair) outcome in environmental pollution is to punish the polluter, hence, ‘the polluter pays principle’. This principle states that if you pollute the environment, you should be held accountable.
Agricultural activity produces many different types of pollution, some of which are easier than others to prevent, stop or clean up after.
Examples where risks can be seen as necessary in the context of successful farming are in spreading of chemical and manure fertilisers, which contain high levels of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium.
All of these could cause algae blooms, a decrease in oxygen levels, or large-scale fish kills, if they should run off into a water system.
Eutrophication, which is caused by nutrient enrichment, remains a significant issue in pollution of waters.
The polluter pays principle is applied with equal levels of seriousness to both domestic households and Irish commercial businesses such as farms.
Protection of the environment, and penalties to be imposed, are dealt with comprehensively in the Protection of the Environment Act (2003), Environmental (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act (2011) and The Waste Management Acts (1996 to 2011).
Another big influence on Irish law surrounding the protection of the environment has been EU law.
The various regulations and directives provide us with strong and universal guidelines to follow.
The law is very clear.
The Nitrates Directive provides us with clear and unambiguous guidelines.
Chemical fertilisers, livestock manure and other organic fertilisers and effluents must be spread as accurately as possible.
You must not spread when, the land is waterlogged, flooded or likely to flood, frozen, or snow-covered.
You also should not spread when heavy rain is forecast within 48 hours.
If the ground to be spread is steep, and there is a risk of water pollution, and there is a high possibility of surface run-off, or the soil conditions are unsuitable, you must not spread.
There are also various buffer zones established such as the restriction in spreading organic fertiliser within 20 metres of a lake shoreline.
These should be checked, and the instructions followed.
Farmers should make themselves aware of the dates for spreading organic fertiliser, before making the decision to spread early or late in the year.
These are all important steps to prevent the polluter having to pay hefty fines in respect of environmental damage.
Among the schemes which play a positive role in protecting the Irish environment is GLAS (which stands for green low carbon agri-environment scheme), the main objectives of which are to improve water quality, promote a greener environment, and retain carbon stocks in the soil (by measures such as planting of trees).
In GLAS, 28,000 participants have signed up to take part.
For farmers, guidelines in GLAS which must be followed include to reduce the amounts of reseeding and to have long-term permanent pastures for at least eight years.
This does not lead itself to an intensive farming system, where reseeding is a must in order to maintain or increase yield levels. It is also encouraged to establish more hedgerows on farms.
Farmers receive payments for the completion of the various environmental tasks, which also include fencing all the watercourses and using low-emission slurry spreading. GLAS was an important step forward in protection of the environment.
It provided an incentive based approach rather than the punishment we saw before.
