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Seeing a difference in nutrient concentration on the river course isn t going to happen overnight. it s going to take a number of years for for improvements in reductions in nitrate and phosphate levels, but it can be done. but it s something that probably has to be started sooner rather than later. scotland s environmental regulator spends £900,000 a year on a dedicated team of 12 inspectors and support staffjust checking water pollution from farms. so, what about in wales? natural resources wales are the environmental regulator, but while they do inspect some farms, they don t have a full time, fully funded team like in scotland. speaks welsh. in charge of water quality at nrw is sian williams. we know there are problem areas in the wye catchment. have you done what ....
Sure that where you can get perhaps quicker wins, i see that obviously it s a long term issue, but we look for for quick gains too. nrw, which oversees much of this, has had its funding consistently cut. if nobody s policing things like muck spreading, are you prepared to tell farmers that they can t spread muck on their land because there s too much phosphate in the river already? well, we have to look at the regulations. we have to look at the individualfarmers, and one of the things we are bringing forward in relation to delaying the one regulation is a licensing scheme. now, if a farmer wants to apply for a licensing scheme and we think that it s not pertinent for that farm, we can do that. but that s from here going forward. a lot of this is legacy phosphorus. that is part of the problem. we are where we are now. and if that s part of it, obviously we can look at it. do you take responsibility for what s happening to our rivers? well, of course, i m part of the solution, just as o ....
Course isn t going to happen overnight. it s going to take a number of years for improvements in reductions in nitrate and phosphate levels, but it can be done. but it s something that probably has to be started sooner rather than later. scotland s environmental regulator spends £900,000 a year on a dedicated team of 12 inspectors and support staff, just checking water pollution from farms. so what about in wales? natural resources wales are the environmental regulator, but while they do inspect some farms, they don t have a full time, fully funded team like in scotland. speaks welsh. in charge of water quality at nrw is sian williams. we know there are problem areas in the wye catchment. have you done what ....
The scots are doing? so what we ve done a lot is targeting different kinds of farms, so we had a dairy project that we ran for a couple of years, which we re now looking at how we can evolve that dairy project into looking at different catchments and looking more around nutrients and phosphates as well. it s key having people on the ground to deliver it is so important. and as i said, that s why we are looking into notjust external funded programmes that are temporary, but we re also looking at our baseline funding with welsh government. your budgets have gone down about, by a third, i think, since its inception. does it sometimes come down to resources? we would like to do more. we will do more. we can work with others as well. the welsh government has been phasing in new laws to tackle water pollution from farms, and is currently talking to nrw about resources. nrw told us they have yet to receive any funding to enforce ....
What i m saying is, it s about working together to make sure that, where you can get, perhaps, quicker wins, i see that obviously it s a long term issue, but we look for for quick gains too. nrw, which oversees much of this, has had its funding consistently cut. if nobody s policing things like muck spreading, are you prepared to tell farmers that they can t spread muck on their land because there s too much phosphate in the river already? well, we have to look at the regulations. we have to look at the individualfarmers, and one of the things we are bringing forward in relation to delaying the one regulation, is a licensing scheme. now if a farmer wants to apply for a licensing scheme and we think it s not pertinent for that farm, we can do that. but that s from here going forward. a lot of this is legacy phosphorus. that is part of the problem. we are where we are now. and if that s part of it, obviously we can look at it. do you take responsibility for what s happening to our rivers ....