Queen's University launch the first report on impact of Lough Neagh algae ecological crisis

Queen’s University Belfast launched the first report focusing on the emotional and personal impact of the Lough Neagh blue-green algae ecological crisis.

The crisis has witnessed an unprecedented bloom of blue-green algae spreading through the largest body of freshwater in Ireland and the UK and the source of 40% of drinking water in Northern Ireland.

For many people, this event in the summer of 2023 was an indication and warning that Lough Neagh is in urgent need of help.

To others, it was the obvious culmination of many years of its maltreatment and misuse.

The report, from the Centre for Sustainability, Equality, and Climate Action at Queen’s, focuses on interviews with 12 local people affected by the environmental crisis in Lough Neagh, detailing the emotional, mental, and psychological impacts it has had on them.

Lough Neagh is important to people in different ways, as expressed in the report; it is key for socialising, farming, and for the people of Northern Ireland’s drinking water.

One person expressed the link many people had to the lough from all backgrounds. 

They said: “There is an incredible emotional connection to that great lake we have there. In Britain and Ireland, she is the great lake that’s there, and almost a hidden relationship, a hidden love, respect for it that is now coming out.”

Lough Neagh has been key to farming in Northern Ireland, and the report expressed the support needed for them in this crisis. 

But it does accept that the current farming practices with the runoff of phosphates and nitrates have brought about this problem, and the government and farmers must look for solutions to improve Lough Neagh. 

One person said: “We shouldn’t be demonising the farmer; we need the farmer on our side; they are part of our community.”

And another added: “The policy to intensify agriculture beyond the carrying capacity of the soil and waterways has been the problem.”

However, one person noted the farmers were only acting in accordance with and incentivised by government policy.

They said: “If you’re encouraged to do things and all of a sudden you’ve told you’d doing things wrong. You feel a bit beguiled and think, ‘Hold on a minute, you’ve led me up the garden path; you’ve taken me here. You’ve supported me, you’ve paid me to do all of this, you’ve taught me to do all of this, and now I’m heard, and now you’re saying I’m the cause of the country’s biggest environmental disaster in years, but all I’ve done is follow your policies.”

The report is hoped to bring about awareness of the problems faced by people who are often overlooked. 

That is according to John Barry, Professor of Green Political Economy at Queen’s, one of the authors of the report. 

He continued: “Our hope is that this report will help to raise the voices, concerns, and wishes of those who are too often voiceless and unrepresented in discourses on environmental crisis and action, and left powerless in decision-making.

“Our report concludes that there is a clear emotional dimension of people’s connection to and attachment to the Lough. Many interviewed spoke with affection, reverence, and concern for the Lough, and it was clear they cared deeply for it. As is understandable, this love, care, and connection results in deep feelings of sadness, anger, disbelief, fear, and anxiety as a result of the ongoing ecological crisis.

“One of the main findings of the report is the need for more research into the crisis, ecological, epidemiological, and economic. It is also suggested that this research needs to be more collaborative, involving all members of the community and stakeholders, on the appropriate modes of governance and policy development needed for the restoration and ecologically sustainable management of the Lough.”