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According to information published by MAGRAMA in its Foreign Affairs News Bulletin, the German Ministry of Environment is proposing to tighten the conditions of intensive livestock farming. According to information published by the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the Ministry of Environment seeks to hinder intensive livestock farming in this country, as is would be reflected in the Bill to which the newspaper had access.
One of the objectives of the draft Law on intensive livestock farming is the amendment of several Environment competition laws in various fields, including the Construction Law, the Law on Protection of Nature and some regulations of the Water Act. According to the draft, these changes would mean, first of all, the elimination of a number of privileges hitherto enjoyed by farmers with regard to construction. So far, farmers were allowed to build large barns as long as there were no urban plans and they respected one requirement: the place should have, at least theoretically, a big enough acreage to produce feed for the livestock. The new law proposed by the Ministry of Environment intends to remove this privilege. From now on, councils will have to design an urban plan for farms holding more than 15,000 chickens, 600 cows or 1,500 pigs, i.e., the Consistory will need to discuss every single large barn construction project in its territory.
Following publication of the news, the first reactions came from the German Farmers Association. The main association of German farmers feels that these changes would jeopardize the survival of small and medium-sized farms, which would not be able to cope with the costs of the new requirements, thus favouring the large farms the new law supposedly wants to act against, since they would be the only ones able to afford the required modifications.
Thursday, October 13, 2016 / Foreign Affairs News Bulletin-MAGRAMA/ Spain.
http://www.magrama.gob.es
