The government has abandoned plans to charge farmers for registering exemptions for agricultural waste, following lobbying by the National Farmers’ Union (NFU).

When waste controls were initially introduced to the farming sector in 2006, the government’s Action Plan for Farming outlined a clear commitment not to charge farmers for agricultural waste exemptions. Farmers were told that exemptions involving agricultural waste would be “free of charge and last for life”.

But a recent government review had proposed replacing free exemptions with a system where farmers would be charged every three years.

The new exemptions system will now be introduced in April 2010 but farmers will be given until October 1, 2013 to register new-look exemptions for agricultural waste. The NFU had argued that the proposals would impose yet more cost burdens on the industry, discourage recycling and result in farmers sending more waste to landfill.

In its response to the consultation on environmental permitting, the government said: “In the current economic climate, imposing charges for the registration of waste exemptions may discourage the take-up of small-scale recycling and recovery operations and have a disproportionate impact on small businesses. The government has therefore decided not to prescribe charges for the registration of exempt operations or to provide powers to the Environment Agency to introduce charges under the scheme agreed each year by the Secretary of State.”

NFU deputy president Meurig Raymond said: “Over 82,000 farm premises have now registered waste exemptions. The main reason for this success is because the registration process has been simple and quick and it was sold to the farming community that agricultural waste exemptions would be free of charge and for life.

“We had always argued that, by introducing these charges, the government was backtracking on this firm commitment. The introduction of charges would have resulted in over £4 million taken out of the farming industry each year. Waste and its management are important issues and recycling and recovery of waste must be not be discouraged by introducing more costs onto industry in the current economic climate.”