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Hundreds of Staffordshire and Derbyshire farmers have seen off 'disproportionate' restrictions that could have left them facing potentially costly controls.

Farmers from Leek, Cheadle, Uttoxeter and Ashbourne, who grow crops and rear stock near the River Dove, have won an appeal to stop some land within the river catchment and its tributaries being designated a nitrate vulnerable zone, NVZ.

The NFU worked with Hafren Water consultants to back union members and prevent their land being included in the zone - a tribunal ruled that the Environment Agency's (EA) plans amounted to 'the proverbial sledge hammer to crack a nut approach'.

Defra had 28 days, until 1 February 2018, to appeal against the determination but has not challenged the tribunal’s ruling.

The First Tier Tribunal determination, dated 4 January, said there was 'a question mark over whether an NVZ designation of the Dove catchment area would, in reality, succeed in reducing the concentration of TIN (total inorganic nitrogen) in the River Trent by any meaningful degree given the Respondent accepts that the River Dove is not polluted and, therefore, it must follow that agricultural sources of N are also of limited intensity in this region.'

The determination said: “If the tribunal is correct in this analysis, it would appear the measures the Respondent is seeking to employ by expanding the NVZ designation in an effort to improve water quality in a very modest length of the River Trent amounts to the proverbial sledge hammer to crack a nut approach.”

The tribunal added that to designate a large catchment area to protect only a very small length of the main stem of a river was “unusual and disproportionate”.

The River Dove catchment is around 1,200 square kilometres in area with around 800 farms in it and 200 farmers contributed towards the cost of the appeal with help from the NFU’s Legal Assistance Scheme.

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There are still some areas within the Dove catchment that remain in a zone including the River Tean, Rolleston Brook and Marston Brook.

The NVZ legislation, in force in other parts of the county, aims to increase controls over the storage and use of manures and fertilisers to minimise nitrate run-off from fields into rivers and their tributaries.

The regulations impose restrictions on the spreading of organic manure which means that some farmers are forced to build expensive new slurry storage units.

Data continues to show declining nitrate trends across the country.

NVZs were introduced across the EU as a result of the Nitrates Directive  back in 1996, however, the bulk of areas affecting West Midlands’ farmers were designated in 2002.

Sarah Faulkner, NFU West Midlands environmental policy adviser (pictured below), said since the last appeal water quality has improved in the River Dove and this was due to farmers’ hard work to reduce the impact of their work on the water environment.

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For the latest appeal a comprehensive dossier of evidence was submitted after farmers and growers were given the opportunity to challenge the NVZ status.

The NFU regional team and Hafren worked closely with affected farmers and their group secretaries to keep members up-to-date with the latest on the regulations and the appeal process.

Mrs Faulkner said: “This decision is not just a victory for our farmers but one for common sense.

“There is little scientific evidence to support tightened NVZ regulations in this area, which would have significantly increased the costs to individual farm businesses - particularly those with larger livestock and dairy businesses.

“Farmers in the Leek, Cheadle, Uttoxeter and Ashbourne areas who have fought off this designation with help from Hafren and the NFU will be able to breathe a slight sigh of relief that at least one unnecessary restriction has been dropped.”image expired

She said farmers and growers were already responsible custodians of the land, producing quality food to high standards, while impacting less on the environment and they were also looking after precious resources including water and soil.

Ms Sarah Belton, Hafren senior hydrogeologist, said: “This is a landmark win based on the legal principles of proportionality and polluter-pays.

“The recent deterioration in water quality in the River Trent was primarily due to the lack of dilution of upstream urban nitrate sources (sewage) during the 2011 drought.

“We were able to obtain, analyse and present the required river quality data to prove this.

“It would have been completely nonsensical to penalise farmers within the River Dove catchment for pollution of the River Trent when they did not contribute to it.”

For further details on the tribunal result or on NVZs farmers and growers are urged to contact their nearest NFU office.