EPA in the poo as farmers kick up a stink over animal manure

Reclassifying manure in the same category of waste from factories has farmers worried they’re about to be tied up in red tape, writes Ed Gannon.

Massey Ferguson MF5713 loader work in a manure heap.

WHEN you have a lot of cattle and sheep — as Victoria does — you end up with a lot of manure.

In a way, a cow or sheep is a sort of economic equation. You have inputs and you get outputs. In the case of a dairy cow — of which we are the nation’s capital — you put in grass and you get milk and piles of manure.

Because manure is basically grass that has passed through a stomach, it has great fertilising quality when spread or sprayed on paddocks.

It is the same with horse and chicken manure, both of which become a valuable by-product sold as fertiliser to gardeners.

But the Victorian Government is less enamoured with livestock poo, so from July 1 manure will be deemed industrial waste.

That will put it on a par with the sludge that comes out the back of a factory or machine. And bring with it the same restrictions on storing, handling and transport.

It’s an unfair comparison, farmers say, and a move that will tie them up in more red tape.

Under the July 1 change, anyone depositing, transporting or receiving more than 20 cubic metres of solid manure on their property each month must prepare a “declaration of use” document.

This could even hold farmers liable for checking that anyone can legally receive it.

The Environmental Protection Authority is also considering banning sheep and cattle grazing paddocks on which animal manure has been spread. The usual practice is to withhold stock for three weeks.

Such a move would effectively ban spreading manure to fertilise paddocks, which many farmers rely on.

It is not as though farmers are just flinging it around willy-nilly at the moment.

There are already tight rules on storing manure in ponds on farms so there can be no leakage into waterways.

And farmers understand that when cattle have been treated with antibiotics any effluent must be treated carefully.

But this latest measure will put much more onus on them, even attracting fines of up to $500,000 if there is a spillage during transport, for instance.

Werribee egg producer Brian Ahmed told The Weekly Times it was absurd to declare animal manure an industrial waste.

“We’ve been recycling animal manure for generations,” Mr Ahmed said. “So why after all this time is it now a problem.”

The answer, I suppose, is that we live in a risk-averse society, where even the tiniest risk means banning something altogether, no matter the greater benefit it provides.

Of which manure is a great example.

As an Irishman is wont to say: “This is a shite decision”.

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