The idea
my idea is very simple, remove the ban on straw burning in the uk, when the truth is known europe will follow. this ban was hastely put in place as a knee jerk reaction to city folk who know nothing about land or agriculture,
Why is it important?
The ban on straw/stubble burning is the single most disasterous unethical anti green piece of legislation ever imposed on agriculture, with no consultation a set of city dwellers decided to remove the cleanest greenest way of clearing crop residues, for the price of a match we now have to suffer a number of grass weeds including black grass, sterile brome, ryegrass, and many other weeds some of which are becoming resistant to current chemastry, we now have to replace lost potash and use more nitrates to break down the straw these costs are now proibative, we are facing an increasing problem with pests like slugs aphids and other bugs that carry diseaeses to the next crop, the use of slug pellets has rocketed in recent years, the average chemical cost of a 500 acre unit has risen from £5000 to £30'000 in the time since the ban, to despose of or remove crop residue means a massive increase in horse power to pull the huge kit required to deal with it, pre ban the norm for a tractor was 80hp, since the ban it is now 200hp this means an increase of 5000 gallons of fuel on a 500 acre unit, all this extra kit uses lots of wearing parts from the straw chopper on the combined hervester to the plough, this metal has to be manufactured using valuable resorses at great expence. the carbon footprint alone for an unburnt 500 acre unit must be thousands of tonnes a year if you calculate the mining of ore & potash, manufacture of fertilizers & chemicals, not very green is it! on the other hand fire natures own way of cleaning the land is simple and very effective the smoke from straw is alkaline so no bad immissions it actually helps against the acid rain problem, so instead of more fertilizers more chemicals more fuel more matal lets try less, a simple licence issued to every farmer, if the farmer breaks the rules then they lose the licence for a period say three years and a fine. the cost of production is now outstriping the price per tonne, at zero cost to government we could significantly reduce the cost of food !!!! its a no brainer really isnt it???????