Farmers are being urged to hope for the best but plan for the worst with regard to water availability for 2012.
A drought summit between NFU East Anglia and the Environment Agency today (17 January) heard that irrigation restrictions are highly likely during the 2012 growing season unless there is above average rainfall in the next few months.
Many rivers in East Anglia are flowing at just one fifth of their average rate, groundwater levels are continuing to drop and soils remain dry.
The Environment Agency’s Bob Hillier said December’s rainfall had been about average but so far January had only had received around one third of its average rainfall and the longer term forecast was for drier weather for the next couple of months.
He said everyone, including the public, had a part to play in reducing demand and conserving supplies.
Options open to irrigators include entering voluntary agreements to abstract less water, sharing water with neighbouring farms and trading water with other farmers.
“We need information from farmers about their own water needs and we are working with the water companies. It’s about demand management and emphasising that everyone needs to use water efficiently. Drought is top of our radar at the moment,” he said.
Lark Abstractors chairman Lindsay Hargreaves said: “These are local issues requiring local solutions. It’s up to us to take responsibility and try and move things forward.”
The meeting brought together farmer representatives from each of the major catchments and abstractor groups in East Anglia and is the first of three meetings planned by NFU East Anglia to help growers through the critical late winter and early spring period.
Farmers told the Environment Agency they urgently needed to know what the worst case scenario would be in their catchment so they could take decisions about what to grow. In some cases they might decide to reduce their acreage of irrigated crops or to grow something else instead.
Norfolk farmer Toby Mermagen said: "The key is when will restrictions come in.
"If we know we are likely to get a 50 per cent reduction in June we can start to talk to neighbours to see if they might have water available. At the moment we just don’t know what’s likely to happen."
The Agency said it is looking to provide as much information as possible about how different rainfall levels could affect the introduction of restrictions within particular catchments.
No comments have been made.