A former CDA politician and retired farmer foreman who now lives somewhere above Amsterdam has assured a number of dairy executives in recent months that the Dutch cabinet may go to Brussels again to request a revision of the rules, but for the asylum file and not for manure legislation. Yet a derogation is a right.
Whether he is right, only the future will tell, but the loss of the derogation still hurts agriculture. It is not only a shame, but also worse for the environment. This is the firm belief of the new LTO chairman Ger Koopmans this week a guest at Boerenbusiness.
He certainly wants to work to ensure that the Netherlands gets a derogation again. Formally, there is nothing to stop something like that. The Nitrates Directive does not provide for such a thing as a final derogation.
Derogation is right
Anyone who can provide good substantiation is entitled to it, as the documents show. The fact that the Netherlands is now looking at the end of the derogation is mainly the result of a complicated tying arrangement. In addition, the previous government, in collaboration with the European Commission, linked together a whole dragnet of environmental requirements and shrewdly chosen figures, so that things were bound to go wrong.
French method
France proves that things can be done differently, where six Breton departments with the same number of dairy cows and more cattle were granted a derogation without any significant problems. That is not for 250 or 230 kilos of nitrogen from animal manure, but 210 kilos. The substantiation that is provided and through Boerenbusiness has been requested, is remarkably clear compared to the truckload of studies that the Netherlands produces. But also often reasoned differently. France is of course also a different country than the Netherlands, in every respect. In any case, the Commission agreed. Perhaps the Netherlands can learn something from it and still make an extra appointment in Brussels. What can also help is that there are also new faces there.
RIVM discovers new uncertainties
Recently there have also been new developments at and around the RIVM. It was already known that this mother and guardian of Aerius likes to see itself as the highest scientific benchmark and seems deaf to audits, reviews and the like. Yet, with a long delay, something seems to be moving at the institute. Apparently, the impression should not be given that a scientific twist is being made. The light should come on automatically. In any case, a new publication was posted about the OPS model, reporting new findings uncertainties. The largest in dry deposition (micro-particles from the air).
Precise estimate
Completely in line with the living and thinking world of the researchers, this concerns an estimated uncertainty of apparently exactly 124%. Real-time measurements have never been made, one reports underlying report. Here and there in the country there is a so-called COTAG post, which analyzes some air, the rest is calculation, estimation and modeling. The RIVM assumptions and projections will soon be further refined by (emission) modeling expert Wouter de Heij.