The British Horse Society urges all Horse Owners to obtain
Final Draft of Ragwort code
The British Horse Society (BHS) has welcomed the final draft
of the Ragwort code of practice recently published by Defra.
However, there still remains an area of concern over guideline
distances for risk assessment. The Society urges all horse
owners, along with landowners and other grazing animal owners,
to obtain a copy of the code, and to submit their comments.
The initial draft code of practice to prevent the spread
of Ragwort was launched at the Royal International Horse Show
last July and has since undergone rigorous scrutiny by interested
organisations, including the BHS, Local Government Authority,
Network Rail, Highways Agency and several conservation groups.
The area that still concerns the BHS relates to distances
given in the guidelines to assess high, medium and low risk
infestations of Ragwort in regard to proximity to land used
for grazing horses and other livestock, and land used for
feed and/or forage production. The code suggests high risk
is when ‘Ragwort is present and flowering/seeding within
50m of land used for grazing by horses and other animals or
land used for feed/forage production’; medium risk is
when ‘Ragwort is present within 50m to 100m of land
used for grazing by horses and other animals or land used
for feed/forage production’; and low risk is considered
to be when ‘Ragwort, or the land on which it is present
is more than 100m from land used for grazing by horses and
other animals or land used for feed/forage production’.
The code then goes on to suggest that particular local circumstances
should be taken into account when using the guidelines; however,
the BHS still considers the parameters to be too narrow. The
Society is asking any horse owner who has had problems with
Ragwort growing outside of the suggested parameters, to provide
evidence of that problem to Defra.
Although the BHS is pleased that the wording has been amended
from the original draft to show that these distances are guidelines,
it does not feel sufficient emphasis is given to that fact.
Furthermore, the BHS fears that landowners/occupiers will
hide behind these guidelines to avoid taking action, as has
already been shown in correspondence sent to the BHS by a
riding school proprietor last year.
All comments on the draft code of practice should be submitted
by 9 June to Mrs Judith Marsden, Defra, Farm Focus Division,
Area 2C, Ergon House, Horseferry Road, London SW1P 2AL or
by email to: judith.marsden@defra.gsi.gov.uk Copies of the
code can be downloaded from the Defra website: www.defra.gov.uk.
The BHS initiated the code of practice to prevent the spread
of Ragwort, which is provided for in the Ragwort Control Act
2003. The Act was also initiated by the BHS, and the Society
played a leading role in the steering group set up to produce
the code.
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