Follow-up from the Consultant
Meetings - Your "Need to Know" Summary
Table of Contents
- The recertification process for agricultural operation
strategy or plan development certificates
- NMS renewal and registration—What do I need to know
after five years?
- Changes in dealing with liquid stored in solid storages
for submitted strategies
- Stale NMS: We want to hear from you about that application
for approval
Thanks to everyone who volunteered to organize the meetings, and to those
who attended. Each session had lively discussions and a variety of questions
posted to the ‘parking lot’. Based on your comments during the
communication session, we will provide answers to your questions and a
recap of the key information from the sessions in the upcoming newsletters.
Our first summary is from the Approvals unit.
The recertification process for agricultural operation
strategy or plan development certificates
The Agricultural Operation Strategy or Plan Development Certificates
are coming up for renewal. It is your responsibility to check the expiry
date on your certificate. We recommend beginning the recertification process
one year in advance of your certificate expiring. If you have questions
or would like a study guide to get started please call us at 1-866-242-4460.
NMS renewal and registration—What do I need to
know after five years?
If a farmer has a nutrient management strategy that was approved five
years ago and there hasn’t been any construction or transfers (of
any part of the operation) during that time, you need to do two things
to keep the farm in compliance.
- Have a person certified under the regulation prepare a new strategy
to reflect the operation as it is now.
- Register the operation with OMAFRA.
If there haven’t been any changes to the operation, a new strategy
will be easy to prepare. All you need to do is review the original strategy
and confirm that it is still in compliance. If there have been changes
(for example: livestock changes and/or their management), you will need
to adjust the strategy accordingly. Another reason for adjustment could
be that in the past five years, it has become clear that some aspects
of the strategy are not working as well as you thought. If the farmer
has been diligent in doing their annual updates, preparing a new strategy
should not be a difficult task.
The new strategy should be prepared at least 90 days before the five-year
anniversary of the date the current strategy has been signed. The new
strategy will expire five years after the date it was prepared.
To register the operation with OMAFRA, you need to complete the registration
form on the OMAFRA website.
The next release of NMAN will allow you to print this form directly from
NMAN. Otherwise you can attach the NMAN printout to the form rather than
re-enter information. But be careful, there are some sign-offs on the
registration form that are not on the NMAN printout. Make sure that you
have provided all of the required information and signed the form.
Changes in dealing with liquid stored in solid storages
for submitted strategies
In the past, we have allowed clients to manage runoff by stating that
the storage will be designed to hold all runoff. Similarly, we have allowed
milkhouse washwater to be added to solid manure. While the theory was
good, in practice, it did not work. In many cases, the liquids and solids
separate and need to be handled separately. We have also found that in
some cases the storage has not been designed properly to hold the liquid.
In future reviews, if liquid prescribed materials are to be stored in
a structure, we will consider this structure to be a permanent liquid
nutrient storage. Consequently, it will have to meet all of the requirements
of this type of structure.
Stale NMS: We want to hear from you about that application
for approval
We have found that a number of strategies have gone stale. We have sent
out the request for additional information (RAI), but have not received
any response for several months. After such a long period, we are concerned
with the currency of information contained in the original submission.
In order to keep our files up-to-date and bring resolution to some of
these matters, if we have not heard about an application in about six
months, we will begin the process of refusing approval. We will ask for
more recent information to be submitted. The reviewer of the submission
will contact the strategy preparer and/or the applicant to confirm that
nothing has been sent. Be advised, if OMAFRA has not received current
information or if the review does not proceed at a more rapid rate, the
Director will refuse the submission.
