Time to take conservation seriously

FARMERS are often described as custodians of the environment, but that’s not always true. They could have an even more important future role as custodians — with more financial sweeteners being given to farmers that do most for our landscape, which has already suffered so much destruction.

Not everyone agrees that farmers are always protectors of the environment. Since the intensification of agriculture, following Ireland’s entry to the EU in 1973, farming activity has contributed to seriously damaging our rivers, lakes and uplands, whilst large-scale land reclamation has resulted in the obliteration of archaeological remains and other, irreplaceable features of the landscape.

With an increasing number of farmers no longer actually farming, however, they could become actively engaged in conserving aspects of our heritage and wildlife that are under continuing threat.

The face of the Irish countryside has changed dramatically: ditches, trees, wetlands and hedgerows have been disappearing at an alarming rate, as prairie-style fields, houses and other buildings mushroom all over the place.

Heritage Council chief executive Michael Starrett believes there’s an urgent need to take a more co-ordinated approach to managing the countryside.

“Ireland lags far behind most European countries in the approach it takes towards managing our countryside and we will need to take serious steps to safeguard and protect it. There is a new opportunity for farmers and landowners to receive recognition for the role they play in managing and protecting our heritage, environment and landscape. They perform a unique public service that benefits everyone in Ireland,” he adds.

The Heritage Council wants to see a considerable change of emphasis so that agri-environmental payments go to the farmers that contribute most to heritage management. It says the REPS scheme should help restore and manage habitats for endangered wildlife and plant species, protect and conserve archaeological monuments and traditional farm buildings and offer new recreational and tourism features in the countryside.

“Over the past decade, we have seen a very significant decline in farming and at the same time our national heritage — native wildlife, plants, archaeological monuments and traditional farmyard buildings — have come under increasing threat. Similarly, issues of access to the countryside are more prevalent,” Mr Starrett says.

The corn bunting has become extinct in Ireland since 1990 and 95 bird species, including the barn owl, are threatened or in serious decline. Figures indicate that we have lost 34% of the state’s archaeological monuments since 1840 and much of this loss has taken place on farms. Traditional farmyard buildings are also in serious decline.

“There is a great opportunity for farmers and landowners to play a more significant role in managing our national heritage. This would lead to many benefits for the wider community and could help provide new recreational and tourism enterprises,” Mr Starrett points out.

The Heritage Council also called for funding for farmers who protect heritage to be provided in plans such as the new Rural Development Plan and National Development Plan.

Mr Starrett has also called for a Landscape (Ireland) Act, saying we are now at a major crossroads and will have to make a major choice.

“Why we don’t have such legislation (to protect the landscape) already is hard to comprehend. Providing it would be good for everyone who lives on, or visits, this island,” he maintains.

“Why? Because it would give us a focus and structure in which we can work to resolve all those current issues which today seem to make such graphic headlines. These include loss of farm incomes, decline in rural tourism, decline in quality of life and many others too numerous to mention.” Such legislation, he goes on, would also bring us into line with every other European country and allow us to live up to the commitments we undertook when Ireland ratified the European Landscape Convention.

“Landscape is very relevant to our everyday lives. We all live, work and play in a landscape. Surely something so significant deserves to be looked after in the best way possible,” Mr Starrett states.