Publisher's Synopsis
Farming for Drinking Water is an examination of the 'legal dimension' of the Nitrate Sensitive Areas pilot study taking place in England to see if changing ways of farming can stop water resources being contaminated with nitrate. Sue Elworthy develops the theme of a conflict between ample food supplies and pure drinking water which was suggested by the House of Lords committee which looked at the implications of proposed European Community legislation. She argues that the nitrate problem being constructed as a conflict between food and water is a result of law and administration treating land and waters as though they existed in separate universes. She outlines the development of the law of food production and the law of water management under the impetus of EC law, to show that the law structures the social world that has caused the nitrate problem. Rather than food and water being in conflict, law and administration have caused the problem that the law now seeks to solve. The new proactive, precautionary law is innovative but it is still imposed on other forms of law which have very old and deep roots. This legal analysis is illuminated by the author?s socio-legal research amongst the farmers affected by the study, the administrators which must persuade the farmers and scientists working on the problem. Law is often seen as the instrumentalist end-product of a policy process. This book shows that it may also be the cause of environmental problems.
