Water quality is a huge challenge facing farming and agriculture and responsibility for its improvement does not just lie with intensive farmers.

Bernard Harris of the Department of Agriculture addressed the Irish Tillage and Land Use Society’s winter conference last week on upcoming changes to nitrates regulations.

The Department official stressed how every farming sector has a role to play in the reduction of emissions and improvement of water quality standards whether that farm is in an intensive or extensive production system.

Pressures

Pressures on water quality have come from numerous sources, but Bernard noted an increase in intensive livestock production as one factor and stated that sediment loss, and in turn phosphorus (P) losses, is becoming a bigger issue from the tillage sector.

Bernard noted that water quality has been declining for a number of years. An increase in fertiliser use has been well documented and sales are estimated to have moved up by approximately 2% in 2020.

Nitrogen (N) and P are the main nutrients being lost to water and this is costly to both the environment and the farmer.

Efficient nitrogen use

In order to be sustainable, both environmentally and economically, these nutrients need to be used efficiently and he commented that some of the measures to improve water quality will have to come from a decrease in fertiliser use.

The new nitrates regulations, which will come into effect on 1 January, aim to help in the improvement of water quality.

For example, the majority of P is lost through overland flow and modifications being made to roadways have the potential to reduce the levels of nutrients and sediment to drains and other water bodies.

“We need to break the pathway between the farm run-off and the receiving water.”

Roadway orientation

As a result, all farm roadways will be subject to the new nitrates regulations which will come into effect on 1 January 2021, regardless of stocking rate.

This means that tillage farmers will also have to comply. Existing roadways will have to be cambered or oriented away from watercourses or dry drains.

Guidelines from the Department of Agriculture state that where "an existing roadway is effectively level, and adjacent to a watercourse, an option is to resurface it with 804 grade stone and dust to a 1-in-25 fall away from the watercourse".

The Department recommends that new roadways are not installed adjacent to or near watercourses, but if this is the case, the run-off must be redirected away from the watercourse.

Nitrogen loss

Bernard also stressed the need for improved nitrogen management on more free-draining soils.

He added that his department is working on critical source area maps to aid farmers and advisers in placing mitigation measures in place on farms.

While nitrogen is a bigger problem on free-draining soils, he commented: “Phosphorus is an issue for every farmer. We know, irrespective of system, as little as 100g of P/ha can cause an ecological status issue within water quality.”

Other measures

All livestock farms will be required to fence watercourses and setback water troughs from watercourses on the farm.

Farms with a whole farm stocking rate operating above 170kg N/ha (excluding exports) will be required to use low emissions slurry spreading equipment from late April 2021 and will also have a liming requirement, as well as reducing crude protein levels being fed in rations.

This will affect approximately 11,500 farmers across mainly livestock and some mixed farms.