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Dairy Industry Ireland (DII) has criticised the newly proposed conditionality for Ireland to renew its nitrates derogation.
It comes after the Department of Agriculture announced plans to change the way it grants derogations after the European Commission said it wants evidence that Ireland complies with the Habitats Directive.
A spokesperson for DII said that measures around the Directive were never previously mentioned.
“Irish farm families have delivered real, measurable improvements in water quality as per EPA and completely in line with Commissioner [Virginijus] Sinkevicius asks in 2023.
“Yet despite this trojan effort, the regulatory goalposts have been unfairly shifted.
“We also have met officials in the current Commission at all levels in Ireland and in Brussels, including Commissioner Roswall, and not once was this additionally mentioned despite the habitats and Nitrates directives being in existence since the early 1990s."
Bureaucracy
DII have also voiced concerns with these measures saying “there is no environmental gain here, only bureaucratic burden”.
“It’s not about protecting nature and water; it’s about ticking legal boxes and I think the public will see through this,” added DII.
“This approach risks undermining trust with the unbelievable and scientifically measurable work our farm families have delivered in recent years here.
“We fully accept the Minister and his officials are working in good faith with these proposals and the Irish agri-community will not be found wanting, with the EPA themselves confirming that greenhouse gas emissions, nitrates levels and ammonia all going in the right direction.
“We strongly urge that a very strong parallel process based on the science, legality and most of all fairness, be pursued in advance of agreeing to an appropriate assessment model where there is absolutely no evidence of any environmental benefit to come from same.”
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