teignbridge farmers have been given a helping hand in getting to grips with new agricultural waste regulations which came into force on May 15. On Wednesday, a well-attended workshop was held at Youghouse Farm, Ashburton, by Adas, the agricultural development advisory group. The Environment Agency has been anxious to reassure farmers that they will be taking a 'softly softly' line – at least to start with. 'Farmers will be helped and guided. It would not really pay to come in heavily from day one,' said agency spokesman Mike Dunning. He said there was a 'pretty high level of awareness' as the regulations were due to be introduced in 2003, but that it would probably take farmers some time to master the detail. Under the regulations, farmers are no longer allowed to burn or bury waste on their land but will have pay from £40-£150 a tonne to have it removed by an authorised contractor. There are some 26 exemptions – for instance, farmers will still be able to burn untreated timber and hedge clippings. They have until May 15, 2007, to register these with the agency. Those found deliberately flouting the law – by burning toxic materials which pose a threat to health and the environment – could face a fine of £50,000 and up to 12 months in prison if tried in a magistrates court. For the most serious offences, the maximum sentence is five years or an unlimited fine. Chris Braines, Teignbridge Council's waste management officer, said that waste collectors will be on the alert for farmers trying to smuggle farm waste into their domestic wheelie bins. 'The temptation could be to put silage wrap, plastic or tubs of plastic into wheelie bins. If we start getting higher tonnages, we will have to do compliance work, checking the quality of the waste,' he said. Bob Watson, a senior consultant with Adas, believed that farmers were generally facing up to the challenge and anxious to do the right thing. 'The Environment Agency is really looking for quite serious breaches in the waste regulations. 'The average farm doing a fairly tidy business and not creating hazardous waste has nothing to fear,' he said. One area worrying farmers are the exemptions, which, he said, still contain some grey areas and need clarifying by the agency. As well as changing farming practice – only two years ago a survey found that four out of five farmers were burning black plastics – the regulations could also see a reduction in the way farm products are packaged. 'Farmers are likely to ask, when buying a dairy cleaning product, for instance, if the company will collect the container afterwards.' To start with, farmers will be allowed to store waste on farm for a year before disposal. Martin Peake, an authorised waste contractor in Liskeard, said that enquiries were coming through every day but that he was not expecting things to hot up until that grace period ran out. The Environment Agency has estimated that around 400,000 tonnes of waste is produced every year. Mr Peake said the truth was that no-one really knows. He is a member of Farmplas, a collection network, with a dedicated recycling plant in south Wales capable of handling heavily contaminated plastics. Farmplas managing director Ed Jones plans to double his capacity from 30 tonnes a day to 60 tonnes by the end of the year. He is also looking to invest £2m on a collection, sorting, washing and processing plant in Devon or Somerset within the next two years. One unexpected outcome of the new controls is that it will close a loophole where 'cowboy' farmers have been able to run illicit waste dumps for commercial operators. Earlier this year, the agency carried out an aerial survey of the south west and pinpointed several such dumps outside Exeter. The regulators also have access to satellite images, which should discourage anyone tempted to carry on as before. For more information on exemptions, or any aspect of the new regulations, ring the Environment Agency's hotline on 0845 6033113.
