The Cabinet should stop farmers buying more nitrogen space for aviation and highways. Two proposals for this were adopted in the House of Representatives.
The fact that Schiphol Airport buys nitrogen rights indiscriminately, deputies are going the wrong way from left to right. “Wild West practices must end,” says Dirk Boswick (CDA). He can’t stand the fact that the airport is now hastily buying up the rights, while a group of some three thousand farmers have been waiting for years for a permit.
The CDA member wants “immediate measures taken, so that nature reporters and PAS reporters have priority.” By this he refers to farmers who have taken all kinds of sustainable measures, because then they will receive a permit from the government. However, the judge referred the so-called PAS scheme to the trash, which means that this group of farmers is still without a permit. The motion adopted by the CDA, BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB), and SGP states that nitrogen space should be used to legalize PAS detectors and restore nature. and that the “nitrogen hunt on farmers for highways and aviation” must end.
GroenLinks argued last year that the right of first purchase should go to the municipality. “Now it looks like the Wild West and that drives up prices,” MP Susanne Kruger laments. “It’s ridiculous that Schiphol or Rijkswaterstaat would buy that space.” A proposal approved by GroenLinks and the Party for the Animals states that the Schiphol Group is no longer allowed to buy growers, because the allocation of nitrogen space is scarce for “social considerations”.
“Now take control,” also asks Thom van Campen (VVD). “But if the companies reach an amicable solution with Schiphol, I am not against it in principle.” “If you’re a rancher and you’ve been hearing for three years that you’re being helped, and now you’re hearing that Schiphol is buying the nitrogen space, you’re thinking: How? I don’t get it either.”
The government itself also wants to have a bigger say in buying the nitrogen space. The Cabinet hopes to have arranged by April that the right of first purchase will be in the hands of the government.
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