Fens face climate change battle

The Fens are more at risk from climate change than any other part of England, a conference heard yesterday.

Scientists, academics, farmers and clergy gathered at Ely Maltings to hear the Environment Agency's predictions for how global warming was likely to affect the low-lying area bordered by King's Lynn, Boston, Peterborough and Cambridge.

Dr Wright said the agency expected mean temperatures in the Fens to rise by up to a degree by the 2020s, and summer rainfall to decrease by 20pc and winter rain to increase by 10pc.

Sea levels around our coasts are expected to rise by up to 15cm, while storm surges, like the one which caused the 1953 floods, will become more frequent.

Elizabeth Raneleigh, from the Farming and Wildife Advisory Group, said almost half of Britain's most productive farmland was in the Fens.

She said threats to farming from global warming included water shortages, storms and flood damage, drought, new pests and diseases and seasonal change.

"There are opportunities farmers see, as well," she said. "With a longer growing season and opportunities to plant crops earlier, they can get better yields and there are new crops they will be able to grow like sunflowers, maize and even grapes."

The Fens, with their predominantly peaty soil, are the only area of land in the UK which emits carbon dioxide, one of the greenhouse gases responsible for global warming.

"Ploughing produces CO2, so if farmers use reduced-tillage systems, this can help to mitigate global warming," said Mrs Raneleigh.

"Farmers have been quite excited about growing biofuels but even if all our land went over to producing biodiesel, it would barely touch the energy we use. But there is the possibility of farmers producing the energy they use themselves."

Mrs Raneleigh added the farm of the future could be the focal point of rural communities' efforts to reduce carbon emissions.

"Every farm could have things like turbines, solar panels and wood burners not just for themselves but for the whole community."