No week without nitrogen, or can it be done differently?

Now that Femke Marije Wiersma can't seem to figure it out, Prime Minister Dick Schoof has set up a task force for it, according to sources in The Hague. In fact, Geert Wilders has even a tweet dedicated to. He wants to 'stop the excessive nitrogen rules'.

VVD the new D66?
This does not mean that immediate action will be taken. The problem is that within the current group of government parties, the VVD has more or less taken over the role of D66 from the previous coalition. Modern VVD members have little to do with agriculture, they hardly even seem to know Thorbecke's principles anymore. Moreover, the agricultural committee that was once important within the party had to merge with the nature and environment committee a few years ago and real agricultural voices no longer reach the Lower House. The NSC is also not very eager to break with the nitrogen policy of the past years, certainly not since Rosanne Hertzberger resigned as a Member of Parliament.

Late repair PAS ruling
So it is complicated, to put it that way. Fortunately, at the end of last year the Council of State was there, which, with a delay of almost five years, gave a further interpretation to the PAS ruling of 2019, and then so ruthlessly that a great many non-agricultural activities and even public housing will have to be restricted if the country's wisest lawyers are followed.
This is not to deny or disregard the authority of the judiciary. We cannot do without it, but perhaps the judiciary makes itself untrustworthy if it uses purely legal arguments to make assessments and decisions on matters of which it itself knows far too little in terms of content, and therefore does not foresee the consequences. It would not be the first time that the Council of State has made a blunder. See its failure in the Child Benefit Affair.   

Aerius and the alternative
For the time being, however, the Netherlands is stuck with the consequences of the fact that the Hague politicians have decided to give a nitrogen model (Aerius) the say over daily life in the country. Aerius is the legally prescribed instrument for all your nitrogen problems! See for example the new Environmental Act.

The funny thing is that there is still a route, even prescribed from Brussels, but long ignored in the Netherlands. Perhaps there will be more attention for it in the coming period, as the Aerius pain increases. However, the political and green resistance to get out of the carefully constructed trap is great.

Hordijk censored
This is also very clear from a new batch of internal documents, which were released after a WOO request. This batch concerns the creation of the Report of the Hordijk Commission in 2019, still under the administration of then minister Carola Schouten. Comparison of these documents with the final report of the Hordijk Commission (officially: Advisory Committee on Measuring and Calculating Nitrogen) shows that the final report has been heavily censored. The committee literally makes mincemeat of both the supervision of Aerius and the reliability. Some quotes: "The governance is incredibly confusing. There are too many ministries involved. The RIVM has a certain degree of scientific freedom, but the steering group (with representatives from politics) is in control. The amount of expertise is very thin. The agricultural emissions have been fully calculated." It is further stated that the agricultural emission data come from NEMA, which falls under the Committee of Experts on the Fertiliser Act (CDM) and that this data has not been validated." If you want to know more, can the piece read it yourself. However, not all of this was allowed to be included in the final report, because Aerius had already become too important.

Bromet fan-off
How bad things are with Aerius, Member of Parliament Laura Bromet has now also understood, as she said last week in a conversation with Agractie chairman Alien van Zijtveld. Bromet had to learn that the hard way, but has learned. De Telegraaf turned that conversation into a cooperation program, but that was not it, says Van Zijtveld. It was yet another signal from agriculture that a solution must be found one way or another for the created nitrogen problem. Still, it is doubtful whether Bromet and her party will go along with a solution for the nitrogen problem à la Wilders, Schoof, or Mona Keijzer.

Brabant wants even more
In the meantime, not everyone is tired of today's strict nitrogen approach. The province of Noord-Brabant has, after the Council of State ruling at the end of last year, only introduced a special nitrogen counter opened. Anyone who has had enough of all the misery and wants to close down the company is welcome to come by. For the provincial government, it is still harvest time.

Counter gas for CDM
The CDM, an advisory group for the Minister of LVVN, mentioned above, is not having the publicity on its side. Last year, it loudly and clearly claimed that artificial fertilizers actually leach just as little as organic fertilizers (i.e. from animals). In doing so, it contradicted new evidence from scientist Herman de Boer. He did not let that sit and now defends his findings once again with his own article in the science journal Pulse, which can also be read on Linkedin. Now of course it is not about the scientific discussion, but about the importance for agriculture and for that it is good to know that organic fertilizers remain available for the crop longer (and cheaper). The Netherlands Center for Manure Valuation (NCM) has calculated in the meantime that Dutch farmers in practice still remove far too much manure, despite some adjustments in the rules for gaseous losses. Given the current manure problems, it would be nice if the gap between rules and practice could be reduced.

This requires that politicians make it clear what is leading for the further development of the Netherlands: computer models, protocols and other bureaucratic instruments or politics itself that determines the direction.