Nitrogen plans expected to close an extra 10-30% of livestock farms

Agriculture Minister Van Essen's nitrogen plans will lead an extra 10 to 30 percent of livestock farms to close between now and 2035, Wageningen University researchers expect. That comes on top of the roughly 10 percent of all farms expected to stop by then anyway.

The farms that remain will keep getting bigger. A dairy farm averaged 51 cows in 2000 and now averages 114. An average pig farm has 3,900 pigs and an average poultry farm has 45,000 egg-laying hens. The researchers conclude the plans do not endanger food security.

In a sample of dairy farmers, 5 percent of farms already meet the cabinet's requirements, which include ammonia emission limits and pasture-per-cow rules. Lead researcher Petra Berkhout expects that even with help from the nitrogen fund (stikstoffonds), a considerable share of livestock farms will not make it, in sectors other than dairy too. Larger farms can invest more and are likelier to survive, the researchers expect.

The nitrogen package is very drastic for the farming families involved.Petra Berkhout, Wageningen University

Berkhout adds that livestock farming must shrink to meet nature and environmental goals, and that it is crucial for governments to be able to issue permits again. Farmers who stop create room and opportunities for those who continue, she says.

The study is a first, rough analysis of the economic impact on farms of the plans Van Essen presented in June. He has since presented the nitrogen bill (stikstofwetsvoorstel). After a summer of farmer protests and talks with the sector, he changed a few points, but most is unchanged. Berkhout says the overall task of cutting agricultural ammonia emissions by 42 to 46 percent has not changed, so the conclusions still broadly hold. Rules for the buffer zones could still change.