Pollution of Drainage Water as a Result of Crop Cultivation

The policy pressures that contribute to the environmental problems arising from the pollution of drinking water from crop cultivation include

- The concentration of production and processing close to areas of demand which tend to be highly populated areas, creating problems of polluted water disposal
- Inappropriate input and output pricing policies including income support schemes, subsidies on inorganic fertilisers and feeds
- Inappropriate or non-existent regulatory policies that fail to respect local natural resource management and environmental needs
- Economies of scale that encourage the use of a large volume of inputs leading to a large volume of polluting effluents
- Inappropriate financial policies on various inputs, exchange rate and import/export policies

Policy options that can lessen the environmental risks from the water pollution include

- Environmental regulation:

- Improvements in the management of water resources leading to reduced output of polluted water and to ensure that the polluter pays
- Policies and incentives to encourage the purification and recycling of polluted water
- banning or limiting the use of certain inputs that pollute the water

- Regulatory policies to reduce level of effluents including safeminimum standardsand effluent charges
- Zoning policies to limit the impact of polluted water, including relocation away from urban areas and important water courses as well as areas with the infrastructure to handle emissions
- Adapting pricing, subsidy and taxation policies to ensure recovery of full cost arising from pollution as well as efforts to limit the production of polluted water and to assist in the greater sustainable use of water resources
- Investment incentives/transitional subsidies to encourage improvements in infrastructure to reduce emissions and encourage producers to move quickly to new minimum standards
- Encouragement of R & D to both limit the amount of water polluted and to reduce the amount of water needed to grow crops

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