The Wye is being killed by toxic industrial chicken factories along its banks. Such disasters are happening all over the UK
The longer this goes on, the deeper the mystery becomes. It’s as if the public authorities had set out to destroy an entire region’s economy. Last year, a group of us tried to raise the profile of an astonishing scandal: the impending collapse of one of the most treasured and “protected” rivers in Europe, the Wye, which flows through Wales and England. We showed how chicken factories in the catchment are turning this beautiful river and its tributaries into open sewers.
The two county councils through which the river mostly flows, Powys and Herefordshire, have between them granted planning permission for giant steel barns (factories, in reality) that contain an estimated 20m birds. Many were approved on the grounds that they would probably have no significant environmental impact. Amazingly, at no point was the cumulative impact considered: every decision was taken as if in isolation.
George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist
