“If such showers fall again, exactly the same will happen as last year.” Farmer Willem Valkering from Egmond aan den Hoef has still not seen a disaster plan from the water board, and that makes him gloomy. Exactly one year ago, his bulb fields were completely under water within an hour and a half. Water he didn’t get from his plots for three days. The lost crop cost him several tons.
Bulb farmer Willem Valkering and his company that he runs together with his brothers is literally in the lowest point: the Egmondse Sammerpolder. This was clearly noticeable during the extreme rainfall in mid-June last year. “This area is the deepest. It became a bathtub. And we had nowhere to put the water. The ditches were full for days.”
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Every effort has been made to get the water off the land. “The entire polder was full of tractors and pumps. All colleagues and contractors who came to help, without even having to ask. The solidarity was great.”
“But next door”, he says, pointing to the Sammerpolder pumping station on the other side of the ditch along his land, “nothing happened.” And that irritates Valkering. “Not much can be done against such a cluster shower, but you can respond to it. We went ‘pre-pumping’. The water board did nothing.”
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emergency plan
After the storm last year, the water board promised to come up with a plan to deal with such extreme natural disasters. “About three weeks ago we had a meeting, and then we asked again about the emergency plan, but then nothing comes at all.”
And that disappoints Valkering. “Because we are now a year further. If it starts to rain again tomorrow, exactly the same will happen as last year. There is no direction at all, there is no plan and that bothers me. I also know that it is difficult, but do something. Say us how we should pump. The water has to leave the polder as quickly as possible, so that the damage is limited.”
Solutions
According to the bulb farmer, the water board knows exactly where the bottlenecks are for the polder. “We told them that again during that meeting: a lock in Alkmaar and the reservoir water of the Egmondermeer must be connected to the Bergermeer.”
“This is known and no longer needs to be explored. Get started to realize it, but it’s talk, talk, talk.” As long as no adjustments are made to water management, the low-lying Sammerpolder will remain a risk area in the event of such mega showers.
That does not mean that Valkering thinks it is unwise to farm there. “It is very good soil. Only the water has to be properly regulated: good for the future. We will have different weather and then you have to change with it.”
Reaction water board
Water Board Hollands Noorderkwartier says it area around the Egmondermeer is being tackled† “This is a vulnerable area, we have known that for a long time,” says Hoogheemraad Klazien Hartog. “We’ve been working on it for a while. But changing a water system is not something you do from one day to the next.†
Over the past year, the water board has also had plenty of discussions. With, among others, the farmers, but also with the Security Region with whom cooperation was difficult. “We have to tackle this together, and not do things separately. We will also take control of this. And those conversations are going well.”