RIVER ACTION is to intervene in a legal challenge brought by the National Farmers Union (NFU) against tighter waste guidelines for manure, the charity announced yesterday.

The NFU is taking Herefordshire County Council to court over its local plan for minerals and waste.

The new rules require stricter management of manure from livestock and for agricultural developments to be “nutrient-neutral” to avoid pollution of the soil.

According to River Action’s legal representative Leigh Day, the NFU argues that manure from intensive poultry units and other agricultural developments should not be classed as waste under the council’s plans.

But River Action says that such material causes environmental harm, arguing that livestock manure has resulted in damaging algal blooms appearing in the River Wye.

It should not be assumed that manure stored and sold to a third party will be used in an environmentally safe way, the charity also maintains, so it wants controls in place to make sure that waste producers dispose of waste lawfully.

River Action founder Charles Watson said: “It is beyond preposterous that the tens of thousands of tons of animal excrement that spews each year out of Herefordshire’s intensive poultry factory farms is anything other than waste — and environmentally harmful waste at that. 

“We feel that for the NFU to try and wriggle out of behaving responsibly and agreeing to co-operate with the county council’s plans to dispose of this waste in a sustainable manner is yet another lamentable example of the big agri lobby showing scarce regard to protecting the environment.” 

The NFU was contacted for comment.