Flooding useful farmland
SIR – The National Trust is not the only organisation intending to flood areas of productive farmland (Letters, February 20). According to its website, the RSPB intends to create “over 5,000 hectares of new wetlands in the Fens in the next 20 years”. English Nature, Huntingdonshire county council and the Environment Agency are involved in similar activity.
Drained Fenland plays a major role in the provision of food for the nation. Reverting to wetland would undo the remarkable civil engineering feat of the 17th to 19th centuries.
Over a third of all Britain’s outdoor vegetables is grown in the Fenlands, which contain around 50 per cent of the country’s Grade I farmland. This man-made, incredibly productive land should not be destroyed without public debate, especially as food supply may become more critical with climate change.
There seems to be a loophole enabling piecemeal creation of wetland from farmland without going through the normal planning permission processes.
Mary O’Toole
Marlow, Buckinghamshire
