Welsh farms breaking environmental regulations ∞
A recent internal report from Natural Resources Wales reveals that 63% of the farms they inspected were found to be breaking environmental regulations.
The report covers the period from November 2023 until the end of June 2024, when NRW conducted 372 farm inspections in Wales, focussing on higher-risk farms – predominantly dairy (250) and beef (101), with a few sheep and poultry farms and one arable farm. The report evaluates compliance with the Welsh Control of Agricultural Pollution Regulations.
Of the 372 farms inspected, 236 (63%) were found to be non-compliant with one or more of the regulatory requirements. By the end of June 2024, only 23 of those farms had been brought into compliance.
The most common problem was inadequate silage storage, followed by problems with manure and slurry storage, nutrient management planning, and yard drainage.
93% of the non-compliant farms were members of a ‘quality assurance scheme’ (as were 91% of compliant farms).
I asked NRW which assurance schemes were covered by this statistic, but their press office told me that they don’t know. Apparently they don’t record which assurance schemes each farm is a member of. This denies us the opportunity to evaluate which schemes, if any, provide a genuine assurance of good environmental standards and which are untrustworthy greenwash.
Red Tractor is the largest assurance scheme in the UK and a previous report from the Environment Agency in England revealed that Red Tractor Assured farms were less compliant with EA inspections than those not in the scheme.
Evidently, membership of ‘quality assurance schemes’ doesn’t guarantee compliance with minimum legal standards.
This data exposes the threat to Welsh rivers. Farming is a major cause of river pollution, alongside sewage. Governments and regulators need to ensure all farms comply with the law, or face consequences.