An 80-year-old farmer in England was being forced to pay $52,000 (£40k) to remove rubbish that was illegally dumped on his land by miscreants, until a kind neighbor set up a fundraising campaign to help clear the mess.
The farmer in his eighties was facing prosecution, after the UK Environment Agency deemed the clean-up job too large for them to get involved, according to SWNS news agency.
200 tons of waste like roofing material, plumbing fixtures, and construction cast-offs was dumped last year in his field alongside a road in Hertfordshire, near St Albans—over 40 dump truck loads.
The perpetrators could never be identified, so responsibility for disposal of the trash fell to the elderly farmer who wishes to remain anonymous.
After reading about the farmer’s plight, Archie Ford launched a JustGiving fundraiser which met its goal in just three days. When the story made headlines, more donations came in raising £58,000 in total.
This week, Archie met with the victim and neighboring farmer Will Dickinson, who has been supporting the effort.
“I was facing a real-life nightmare, but I’ve been blown away by the support I’ve received from so many people,” said the anonymous farmer.
“This has restored my faith in humanity. I am so grateful to everyone who has supported me. I had no idea what was going to happen to me.”
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Almost 2,000 donors sent money, and the thousands of dollars leftover will be used to support other victims of waste-dumping in Hertfordshire, which is about an hour north of London.
31-year-old Archie said it was ‘outrageous’ that farmers were deemed responsible for dumping if the perpetrators couldn’t be found.
“I knew I had to do something as soon as I read this farmer’s story. The situation he was facing was so unfair—and I have been amazed by how many people have supported the crowd-funder.”
The National Farmer’s Union is urging authorities to work together to secure more arrests and convictions—for strong penalties that reflect the impact of the crime. Currently victims may have to report incidents to multiple authorities, which the organization says is time “consuming, confusing and frustrating”.
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Archie says not everybody can rely on a fundraising campaign, so things need to change. The London Times reported that waste management companies charge up to £450 per ton of commercial, non-recyclable trash, so wrong-doers are choosing to hire criminals to dump the rubbish illegally.
“The situation is out of control with organized criminal gangs taking advantage of a deeply flawed system and our hardworking farmers are suffering as a result.”
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He backs the NFU’s calls for a major shake-up in how waste-dumping is tackled—a crime that costs the UK’s farming industry hundreds of millions of pounds annually in clean-up costs.
The criminal offense in the UK is punishable by unlimited fines or up to 5 years in prison, but the culprits are hard to catch.
Neighboring farmer Dickinson, an NFU member, has dealt with his own share of illegal dumping (which Brits called fly-tipping).
“There are so few arrests for fly-tipping and on the rare occasions when somebody is convicted, they receive a fine which is less than the cost of hiring a skip.”
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“We need stronger sentences to act as a deterrent, or criminal gangs will continue to wreak havoc on the countryside with impunity.”
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