THE European nitrates directive placed an unnecessary burden on British farmers, who already managed their use of chemicals better than the regulations dictated, an expert told a gathering in North Yorkshire.

Jonathan Birnie, a policy adviser with the National Farmers' Union, said the science behind the directive, implemented ten years ago, was flawed and it was costing farmers thousands of pounds more than ministers had estimated.

The European Courts of Justice had recently ruled that 13 of the 15 EU states had completely misapplied the directive. "That would suggest the directive was wrong in the first place," Mr Birnie told a North Yorkshire Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group forum at Askham Bryan college, York, on Thursday of last week.

The vast majority of British farmers already used nitrates in the most economical and environmentally friendly ways and the nitrate content of UK water was well within world health organisation recommendations.

The directive had been drawn up to address a number of perceived health risks linked with nitrates, but these were mostly irrelevant to the UK, said Mr Birnie.

"Blue baby syndrome" was now extinct in Western Europe, cancer links with nitrates had been disproved - scientists now believed nitrates were beneficial - and the only British coastal waters affected by blue-green algae were in a small area off northern Scotland.

"If the EU had come up with a phosphates directive, we couldn't have complained at all," said Mr Birnie . "As it is, the science is flawed and farmers in this country have better ways to regulate and manage nitrogens."

The stringent record keeping required by the directive was manageable by arable farmers, who already kept that sort of information, but livestock farmers struggled to keep accounts of how many animals were on which field, for how long, and how much manure they would have produced.

Regulations in place before the directive were adequate to control nitrate levels in water, the mapping process was questionable and delays in consultation left farmers little time for discussion, said Mr Birnie.

Research by the NFU suggested the costs of complying with the directive would exceed the EU's estimates. Record keeping alone would cost an average £170 a year per farm, with the highest bill falling to pig and poultry operations.

The Government estimated average storage cost at £3,000 a year per farm. NFU research suggested this would be more like £4,500. Haulage could cost up to £33,000 a year for pig and £5,400 for poultry farms.

"The Government reckons the total UK cost will be about £27m; the NFU estimates it will be £58m," said Mr Birnie.

The NFU was discussing with the Government possible alternatives to the directive and woud lobby ministers for more cash to help farmers meet the demands of the regulations.

l David Collier of the NFU urged farmers to use a guide it had produced on the environmental impact assessment regulations which came into force on February 1.

The NFU was concerned that the rules meant more uncertainty about the ways farmers could manage their land, less flexibility and a possible reduction in the value of farmland where improvements were not permitted. It was also a further barrier to the uptake of agri-environmental schemes.

Mr Collier also suggested farmers seek further information from the Defra EIA helpline (0800 028 2140). Help in interpreting the regulations was available from the NFU corporate legal and technical helpline