A significant victory has been claimed by the NFU after MEPs voted not to extend further legislation as part of the Integrated Pollution Prevention Control Directive.
We lobbied hard and won amendments on proposed changes to the directive in 2009. Those plans would have seen reduced thresholds for laying hens, ducks and turkeys and introduced moves to bring more pig and horticulture businesses under the scope of IPPC. Last year’s successes have now been upheld at the ‘second reading’ stage. 
Members of the EU Parliament Environment Committee also voted yesterday to amend a review clause which called on the commission to re-assess whether controls should be extended to include intensive cattle farms and be expanded to control manure spreading. These two points have now been deleted. And the NFU was also successful in convincing members that a baseline report on the status of soil is only necessary when significant amounts of relevant hazardous substances are present.
Disappointingly, however, the requirement for a review by the end of 2012 of the existing thresholds for pig and poultry units, and the size of horticulture businesses covered by the directive, remain in the text.
NFU chief environmental adviser Dr Diane Mitchell said: “I am pleased that the hard work of our staff both here and in Brussels has paid off and MEPs have listened to our calls for changes to be implemented. Specifically it was the Council which pushed for cattle to be included in the IPPC and we are particularly pleased that MEPs have voted to delete this aspect from the directive. More negotiations are now due to take place in the next couple of months and we will be following these talks very closely and lobbying hard to make sure that the significant gains we have achieved for our members remain securely in place.
“The NFU remains convinced that the IPPC Directive is ill-suited to the agriculture sector and we are totally committed to ensuring that the bureaucracy and cost of this burdensome legislation is minimised for those who unfortunately fall under its control.”
The directive will now enter ‘trilogues’ – discussions between the European Parliament, the European Commission and the Spanish Presidency. A plenary vote could follow in parliament early in July.
Read the full NFU analysis on the Environment Committee vote in the briefing note attached to the right of this screen.