Protecting water quality is an issue “for all farmers, not just those that have the largest or more intensive farms”, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has emphasised.
Speaking at the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine meeting this week on the topic of the Nitrates Directive and water quality monitoring, Dr. Eimear Cotter, director of the Office of Evidence and Assessment at the EPA said that the agency is “very much supporting the right measure in the right place”.
She said that the different “soil types, farm practices depending on where we are in the country” will require a “targeted response”, and that areas “where the risk is highest” must be targeted “so that we will have the most bang for the buck”.
“Recognising that depending on where you are, depending on the conditions, the measures need to be targeted and really, overall, it is about implementing what’s there as well as the full range of measures proposed under the new forthcoming [nitrates] action programme.”
Water quality ‘not as good as it should be’
The EPA said that water quality “is not as good as it should be” in Ireland.
“The evidence shows that agriculture is the most significant pressure on water quality,” the EPA said in its opening statement to the committee.
“The most widespread problem is excess nutrients from animals and fertilisers which have resulted in elevated levels of nitrogen and phosphorus in our waters.
“Nutrient levels impact the ability of these waters to sustain healthy ecosystems and cause nuisance algal blooms.
“In terms of drinking water, high nitrogen levels, above the drinking water standard, can pose a risk to human health.
“In particular, nitrogen pollution is causing a pressure in parts of the south, southeast and east of the country.
“A combination of freely draining soils combined with relatively intensive farming means the risk of nitrate leaching is high.
“Rivers such as the Bandon, Lee, Blackwater, Suir, Nore, Barrow and Slaney have high nitrogen levels with significant implications for the marine environments they flow into.”
‘An issue for all farmers’
In terms of other agriculture impacts, pollution from phosphorus run-off is causing “a pressure around the country on land where the soils are poorly draining”.
“There are also problems arising from excess sediment from run-off and stream bank erosion, drainage impacting on physical habitat conditions, and pesticides, herbicides and other chemicals in waters.
“Overall, the message is that protecting water quality is an issue for all farmers, not just those that have the largest or more intensive farms.”
Dr. Cotter added that the EPA “would not be prescriptive about the particular measures that need to happen; we provide the data, the evidence, the science, to support decisions” that are made.
The EPA representatives at the meeting said that the Nitrates Action Programme (NAP) is an “important mechanism to deliver improvements”, however, the “evidence shows that the fourth NAP has not protected water quality from nutrient pollution”.
The EPA supports “the range and breadth of proposed measures” under the forthcoming NAP, “which, if implemented, as proposed, will strengthen the protection of the environment”.
“A one size fits all approach will not be adequate to achieve the outcomes that we need and therefore measures must be targeted to achieve water quality objectives.
“They need to be targeted and specific to the soils, activities and risks on the farm.”
There are approximately 4,900 water bodies of all types in Ireland. About a third are in “difficulty”, with agriculture “impacting about 1,000 water bodies”. Inadequately treated wastewater is “impacting on about 200 water bodies”, according to the EPA’s latest assessment.
Dr. Jenny Deakin, a senior scientist with the EPA, told the committee that of those 1,000, there are “approximately 18 drinking water sources that would have a difficulty with nitrogen”.
“I suppose when we get to the point where we have a human health issue, we’ve really gone past the point of protecting the environment as well,” Dr. Deakin said.
“Thankfully in Ireland we don’t have too many sources that are beyond drinking water standard.”