By Tamsin Smith BBC News reporter in Thessalia, Greece

Environmentalist Yannis Tsougrakis: "The landscape of Thessalia has been transformed."

The supplies to this little Greek village and some of its neighbours are so polluted with nitrates from fertilisers, people cannot even wash up with it.

"We have to use water brought to us in tankers," says the barman, 71 year old Nikolos Kamilirikis. "I can't even water my flowers with it."

"The problem is caused by all the fertilisers used in the fields around us," says the local mayor Rizos Komitsas who has had to issue guidelines and advice on water safety to his citizens.

Transformed

Driving east from the village into the low plains of Thessalia, fields of intensively farmed cotton stretch out as far as the eye can see.

Farmer Serafim Kotinas: "There's no real market in Greece for organic produce'."

Since generous European Union subsidies began in the 1980s, the production of cotton here has tripled, making Greece Europe's biggest cotton producer.

Greek farmers receive 600 million euros ($735m; �409m) a year to grow it.

"The landscape of Thessalia has been transformed," says environmentalist Yannis Tsougrakis from Bird Life Poland.

"Here they used to cultivate wheat and beans, but now it is mostly cotton."

Water

The environmental problems caused by this monoculture are not only down to the use of fertilisers and pesticides.

Papagiannikis: "There are too many vested interests."

"Cotton is an incredibly thirsty crop, and this is a very arid area," explains Mr Tsougrakis.

"There's an ongoing battle to find more ways to bring water here to irrigate it. There's been constant talk about diverting the river Acheloos to bring water here."

Size

In the past there was little incentive for farmers to grow anything other than cotton.

European cotton farmers receive the highest levels of support in the world, according to Oxfam.

But this could be about to change.

Facing the challenge of EU enlargement, Brussels has had a rethink. Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reforms aim to reduce support for intensive agriculture.

Under the new system, farmers get cash according to farm size rather than what crop they grow.

Income

Some young farmers are already taking a different approach.

Barman Nikolos Kamilirikis despairs due to the lack of clean water

Thirty-five-year-old Serafim Kotinas has started farming organically after seeing the damage that his fathers farm was doing to the land.

"I did this for philosophical reasons rather than for making money," he explains, cutting open a large organically grown melon.

"There's no real market in Greece for organic produce."

Mr Kotinas is optimistic that the CAP reform will bring about change.

"I definitely believe things will change because at the end of the day farmers are interested in income and don't care whether their money comes from cotton or from maize or anything else."

Damage

But it will not be easy to change the culture that has flourished alongside Greece's intensive cotton farming.

"There are too many vested interests," says former Member of the European Parliament, Michalis Papagiannikis.

"The political pressure is high because there is a very large modern lobby around cotton - merchants, chemists, company agents," he says, insisting that it is "almost impossible" to push through changes quickly.

Back at the village cafe in Nees Karies, the tap is running but only to mop the floor.