Comment: Why farmers should harness water power to beat floods

As we embark on 2017 it is clear we are in unchartered territory. However you voted in the EU referendum, we are now within a hair's breadth of invoking Article 50 and then there's no going back.
Rachel Hallos farms with her husband Stephen, son Sam and daughter Anna rearing Saler beef cattle and Scottish Blackface X Lonk breeding ewes.Rachel Hallos farms with her husband Stephen, son Sam and daughter Anna rearing Saler beef cattle and Scottish Blackface X Lonk breeding ewes.
Rachel Hallos farms with her husband Stephen, son Sam and daughter Anna rearing Saler beef cattle and Scottish Blackface X Lonk breeding ewes.

Thinking of opportunities and threats associated with Brexit, migration and access to the single market have been at the heart of most debates but what about the nitty gritty of the forthcoming negotiations?

For farmers, a lot is at stake. Everyone is familiar with the Common Agricultural Policy that since 1962 has had a defining impact on the development of UK farming policy. Direct payments to farmers have not only successfully ensured a supply of nutritious, affordable food for all, latterly they have also ensured a keen focus on sustainability and environmental management.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

On my tenanted hill farm above the South Pennine village of Ripponden, we are two years into our second decade of an agri-environment scheme designed to improve targeted areas of the beautiful environment in which we live.

Going forward all that’s guaranteed is that nothing will be the same. Across Yorkshire farm businesses have evolved to meet changing political imperatives. Brexit is our next challenge and we will have to do more to demonstrate the work we do and the services we offer beyond feeding the nation.

At the Oxford Farming Conference George Monbiot said that given the chance, he would farm water. Could this be a replacement viable income stream that would allow farmers to play our part in the management and storage of water? Using our local knowledge it could be and I’d welcome the opportunity.

Think back to Boxing Day 2015. The Ryburn and Calder Valley were hit, like many others, by the worst floods in living memory resulting in landslips, demolished bridges, thousands left heartbroken and homeless, while businesses and dreams were washed away.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Our moorland is one of many on which rain falls before flowing naturally into the valleys. It’s the nature of where we live and why there is a high number of reservoirs here. The movement of water is quite simple; it starts at the top and flows to the bottom. As a farmer I can’t stop it from raining but I can help slow the flow. Grips, dykes, gullies can be blocked but after consecutive wet summers and winters there’s only so much our moorland can soak up. The key is how water is managed.

Farmers have to be more involved in this; and I wonder if we can store more water in the uplands, working in partnership with private and government bodies?

I don’t believe there’s a national answer; local problems often need local solutions and concrete barriers aren’t always the answer. The £35m received by the City of Leeds to protect its residents and businesses is commendable but without devising a plan for what happens upstream, is it value for money?

Water is powerful and harnessing it must be the answer. It’s amazing how important a commodity can become when a financial value is attached. At a time when the rule book is being revisited, let’s think creatively about how we spend our money to protect towns and cities and perhaps consider harnessing the natural flow to address our fossil energy dependency by considering hydropower.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Rachel farms with her husband Stephen, son Sam and daughter Anna rearing Saler beef cattle and Scottish Blackface X Lonk breeding ewes. From February she will become NFU county chairman for the West Riding.

Related topics: