Editor,

I was very glad to read Sarah Reisz’s answer (Letters, Cambrian News, 17 March) to the article by Abi Reader Food production and the environment are not competitors (Cambrian News, 3 March).

I agree wholeheartedly with Sarah Reisz’s observations.Intensive poultry units (IPU) is are not a traditional farming activity. They are industrial units which belong on industrial estates, if, indeed, they should exist at all. The outbreak of bird flu, which has been prevalent in a lot of IPU areas in the last year, suggests the time for these units is over.I live in an area of Herefordshire which has one of the largest concentrations of chicken farms in the country. The smell from these units is very noticeable and particularly so when cleaning out is done. This stink was once — laughably — called an ‘innocent smell’ at a parish meeting by one of the people set to gain by these units. The units are a mile or less away from my home in every direction and I can smell them in my garden on a regular basis.

There has been a noticeable and very unwelcome build up in HGV traffic through the village and parish, including HGVs delivering feed, and removing chickens at the end of regular ‘cycles’ to be slaughtered elsewhere.

The stench and dust from these passing vehicles means that on many days we have to keep the windows at the front of the property closed even in the hottest months.

Visually the intensive poultry units look like warehouses and little is done to lessen their impact on the rural environment - there is much concrete hard standing around these units too, which again is more in keeping with an industrial estate.

I have lived in the countryside for 29 years, and for 20 of these, poultry units have been creeping over the landscape. I have nothing positive to say about them, and everything that is negative.

Even the supposed increase in job opportunities is questionable, because from what I’ve seen, few people, if any, above and beyond the previous farm staff and previous numbers of contractors have been employed.

The role of agriculture — and of IPUs specifically — has had a detrimental effect on the rivers in Herefordshire, including the Wye, Lugg and Arrow.

Chicken manure is still used on fields and run off and the effluent from this industry has to go somewhere...It’s time to stop encouraging diversification into Intensive Poultry Units and start looking at sustainable and environmentally friendly alternatives, where the community as a whole also benefits, and not a minority of people at the expense of the majority of the population.

S. Coleman, Herefordshire