Fields of danger

Aleksander Nowacki strolls the country's pastures and encounters farmlands fouled by fires, fertilizers and mogilniki.

The countryside as an idyllic place where mankind lives close to the land and uses nature's generous gifts for sustenance is the stuff that much of the country's literature is made of. Grounded in the mythical past, this golden age of environmentally friendly agriculture may also prove to be the future, as enthusiasts of organic farming hope.

Be that as it may, the realities of the country's agriculture sector are a far cry from such idealistic visions. Switch on your TV and you may chance upon an ad that shows nests, birds and small animals consumed by flames. This is part of the social campaign to prevent grass fires started by farmers every spring as a way to protect against weeds and increase soil fertility. According to National Fire Service authorities, more than 60,000 fires are lit each year, and the cost of putting them out comes to about E8.2 million (zł. 35 million).

Stopping springtime fires

The environment ministry's promotion and information office has entered into cooperation with TVP3 television network to promote environmental awareness, while at the local level authorities are putting up posters and arranging meetings between farmers and firemen to explain the dangers associated with grass fires.

And these hazards are considerable. Fire is indiscriminate as to which plants it burns, and experts say that the practice of springtime fires is the most important threat to the very existence of many legally protected species. The local variety of orchids and the type of birch tree endemic to the Ojców area in the southern part of the country are singled out as particularly vulnerable.

"Sometimes you get the impression that fires favor those areas where endemic species exist," said Janusz Krzemkowski of the environment ministry's nature protection department.

Nor is environmental hazard the only consideration, as every year two or three farmers die as a result of starting fires, while local papers are full of heart-breaking stories of children and babies suffering serious burns. (Only last week two such cases were reported in the seaside region of Koszalin.)

Old habits die hard, however, and neither educational campaigns nor criminal sanctions have yet succeeded in putting an end to the "cheapest and most popular of herbicides," as grass fire is often referred to.

Spectacular as grass fire is, it is far from the most important environmental hazard connected with agricultural practices in this country.

"It is industrial farms that are a genuine threat to the environment," said Halina Papiz, an expert at the agriculture and rural development ministry. "Our small family farms are environmentally friendly."

This is a mantra often repeated by many defenders of the status quo in the countryside. True as it may be in theory, the reality of small farms is quite different.

Fertilizer cemeteries

"Farmers are often insufficiently educated," says Dorota Metera, deputy chairperson of the organic agriculture council at the agriculture ministry. "Improper use of fertilizers is a major cause of water pollution."

Metera admits, however, that the scale of the problem is very different to what it was prior to 1989, as few farmers can afford chemical fertilizers anymore. Previously, the use of pesticides was thought to be a sign of economic and technological development in the countryside. There was even a time when farmers were penalized for not using enough fertilizer. In the 1970s authorities introduced a so-called "non-returnable loan," under which farmers were not charged interest on loans for fertilizers, and in many cases they were not even required to pay them back at all. This breathtakingly creative contribution to economic theory and practice, coupled with insufficient education on the proper methods of handling pesticides, led to the devastation of large areas of agricultural land.

The transformation of the economic system in the 1990s ended the cheap loans for farmers and brought the price of fertilizers more in line with market realities. The upshot of the change is that the use of pesticides is now down to about a half the average level in EU countries. That is not to say, however, that problems connected with the previous system's irrational focus on "progressive" agricultural techniques are all gone. The demons of the past return to haunt the country's environmentalists in the form of the so-called mogilniki. The word is best translated as "solid waste burials," but environmentalists are fond of pointing out that the original meaning was "cemeteries."

What the inauspicious sounding name denotes is a dump of outdated pesticides. Scattered around the country are hundreds of such dumps left over from the 1970s. When the chemicals expired, the standard procedure was to bury them in the ground and forget all about them. The practice was particularly widespread in the 1970s, although in some cases it was continued until the mid-1980s.

Stanisław Wołkowicz, an expert at the National Institute of Geology and one of the country's leading researchers of the problem, uses an example he remembers from his childhood to illustrate the difference in ecological thinking between then and now.

"When I was a boy scout, we were told to dig a hole in the ground and deposit there all the litter left over from a campsite," he said. "The difference is we looked where we were digging."

That is certainly more than could be said for decision-makers of the day.

"You find these things everywhere, in completely random places," Wołkowicz said. While located mostly in forests, some mogilniki can be found in the middle of a field. As no thought was given to deciding a dump's location, the consequences range from an extremely localized nuisance to a minor environmental disaster.

"Sometimes you can stand on top of one and not even realize it," Wołkowicz continued. "Then again, the odor can be distinct and unbearable for some distance around the mogilnik. It's a lottery."

The scale of pollution depends primarily on the method of deposition and on the type of soil surrounding the site.

Wołkowicz, who has monitored many of the mogilniki around the country since research on the matter started in 1994, says that there are mainly three types of soil where dumps can be found. Heavy, clay-type soil is a good absorbent of pollutants and rainwater, so the danger of a mogilnik situated in it is usually confined to a 20-meter radius around the dump.

It is quite a different matter with mogilniki embedded in solid rock. In this case, the pollutant may be spread over a wide area, but since it is mixed with rainwater, its concentration does not represent a serious environmental hazard.

The most common type of soil in the country is the sandy variety. It is also the type most vulnerable to the pollutants that a mogilnik is likely to produce. Once chemicals are leaked into groundwater, the pollution can spread at a rate of some 50-100 meters per year, sometimes even faster. As some dumps have been in existence for more than 30 years, they may have turned all the waters within a two- or three-kilometer radius into poison.

"It is not uncommon to have wells that farmers use for drinking water contaminated with deadly chemicals," Wołkowicz said.

Facing the problem

There is a rumor that has been making the rounds among the country's environmentalists that there is a mogilnik within a short distance of a drinking water intake for a major city. Wołkowicz, however, is doubtful.

"If a large city were involved, I think the authorities would get worried," he said. "But I know of many cases where (contaminated) water is drunk by rural people."

So far, however, no cases of death can be linked directly to a mogilnik.

Nonetheless, it is enough of a problem for numerous institutions to have become involved in attempts to solve it. From the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management, a government agency, to regional and municipal government institutions to companies interested in using former mogilniki sites as a lucrative business, there is a large number of people interested in the problem. What is lacking is coordination.

While the National Fund has financed the clearing and reuse of the sites of more than 100 dumps across the country, there is no single institution that keeps track of all the mogilniki that have been cleared or are still in existence. Experts agree that the number of removed mogilniki must be close to 200, while there is perhaps twice as many that still need to be cleared out.

"The problem is that no one is quite sure whose responsibility it is," said Stefan Kozłowski, geology professor and head of the Scientific Council of the Green Lungs of Poland Association. "There is no single institution that coordinates water management and environmental protection of water resources in this country. It verges on chaos."

According to Kozłowski, the situation frequently leads to inefficient use of resources. He hopes, however, that EU accession will help to solve the problem. All member states are required to have an integrated water policy and a single body responsible for its implementation.

"We have created a situation where there are practically no waters that meet the highest standards of purity," Kozłowski said. "It need not be that way. What we need is a change in attitude and education."

But the agriculture ministry's Halina Papiz does not share these views.

"We do not have polluted waters," she said. "This is false and dangerous propaganda. The highest purity standards are for the rich."Aleksander Nowacki strolls the country's pastures and encounters farmlands fouled by fires, fertilizers and mogilniki.