Strategies for future agricultural control policies from the Dutch perspective

The Dutch agricultural sector is of significant importance to the Dutch economy, but is also one of the major contributors to the total environmental pollution of the country. At the moment the environmental policy for this sector is centered around two major issues, manure/ammonia and pesticides. The manure-surplus causes pollution of soil, air, ground- and surface water with phosphates, nitrates and ammonia. And although emissions of pesticides are being reduced, the quality of the surface-water is not improving. Under the influence of an increasing market-orientation on both national and international level, a growing insight in the need of regional differentiation and a growing environmental awareness outside the Ministry of the Environment, the way environmental policies are developed is changing in The Netherlands. More and more, parties concerned are involved in an early stage of policy-development, resulting in a policy oriented on objectives that requires a high level of selfregulation instead of a policy based on strict rules and set measures.