Development in the Drought
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Development in the drought The incompatibility of the Ebro water transfer with sustainable development in the Southeast region of Spain Development in the drought -The incompatibility of the Ebro water transfer with sustainable development in the Southeast region of Spain- WWF/Adena Gran Vía de San Francisco, 8-D 28005 Madrid Tel.: + 34 91 354 0578 Fax: + 34 91 365 6336 www.wwf.es [email protected] www.panda.org/dams Texts: Meinke Schouten Edition: Meinke Schouten April 2003 WWF/Adena thanks the reproduction and the circulation of the contents of this publication by every type of media, always when the source is mentioned. INDEX INDEX ............................................................................................................................. 2 PREFACE ....................................................................................................................... 3 1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ........................................................................................ 4 2. THE WATER TRANSFER IN THE SOUTHEAST REGION OF SPAIN.......... 7 3. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN THE SOUTHEAST REGION OF SPAIN .......................................................................................................................................... 9 3.1 THE ENVIRONMENT IN THE SOUTHEAST REGION OF SPAIN....................................... 9 3.1.1 Water disappears........................................................................................... 10 3.1.2 Elimination of the natural landscape ............................................................ 18 3.2 THE ECONOMY IS GROWING, BUT WITH VICTIMS.................................................... 24 3.2.1 More production, less benefits ...................................................................... 24 3.2.2 Society is changing ........................................................................................ 25 4. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ................................................. 28 2 PREFACE The Spanish National Hydrological Plan1 consists of two principal components: a new transfer of 1050 cubic hectometres of water per year from the Ebro river basin to the river basins of Catalonia, the Júcar, the Segura and in the South and a “pack” of 889 public water works (reservoirs, water transfers, etc.) listed in Annex 2. WWF/Adena has analysed the problems caused by the growth of tourism and agriculture in the Southeast region of Spain, the region that will receive the major part of the water. With this report, WWF/Adena intends to demonstrate that the economic, ecological and social situation is very complex, that the unsustainable development has created a structural water deficit and that the transfer will not solve the existing problems. This report is based on the following information sources: • Official data from databanks of the National Institute of Statistics (INE) and the autonomous regions; • Estimations realized by WWF/Adena and other NGO’s; • Examples and studies of specific cases. 1 Spanish National Hydrological Plan (SNHP): approved by the Law 10/2001, of the 5th of July of 2001;BOE no. 161, of the 6th of July of 2001 3 1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Southeast region of Spain2 is changing. Only 20 years ago this region was one of the poorest in Spain (in 1980 the Southeast region contributed nearly 6% to the Gross Domestic Product, GDP). At this moment, the region, with only 8% of the national population, contributes 15% of the GDP.3 These economic changes are reflected in the landscape: large surfaces of agricultural terrain, urban development and advertising signs and less natural landscape. The economic growth of the past few years has produced severe impacts in the Southeast region of Spain, which will be described further on. The Spanish government focuses in their analyses only on the water offer problems and pretends to solve them by means of the Ebro water transfer. This solution, however, does not slow down the non-sustainable growth of tourism and agriculture and therefore the growth of the water demand will not be eased. On the contrary, the transfer stimulates the non-sustainable development in the Southeast region of Spain. Water becomes scarce The economic growth is linked to a major demand for water. Meanwhile, water resources are disappearing, which is, among others things, caused by climate change. Water use has increased without control and in an illegal way, and as a consequence, water availability decreases every day. The most important non-natural cause of reduction of water resources is the continuous growth of irrigated agriculture, in spite of the fact that the implementation of new irrigation is prohibited since the Water Law of 1987. In only three years, from 1997 to 1999, the percentage of irrigated surface has grown from 40% to 44%. Moreover, farmers use more and more irrigation for production of originally dry agriculture. At this moment, there are 2500 legal boreholes in Murcia. Groundwater experts estimate that there are half a million illegal boreholes in the river basins in the Southeast region of Spain. There is an absolute lack of control on the boreholes that are fed by the aquifers and their exhaustion is one of the principal arguments for executing the Ebro water transfer. According to the Spanish National Hydrological Plan, 45 % of the transferred water can and should be used for urban consumption. There is an increase of urban water consumption due to the increase of tourism and not due to the growth of local population. The modern tourist demands quality and this is translated in Spain into pools, gardens and most importantly golf courses. It is estimated that annually nearly 90 hm3 of water (7% of the capacity of the Ebro water transfer and equivalent to the consumption of a city with over 1 million inhabitants) will be used in 2012 to irrigate the golf courses in the Southeast region of Spain. The decrease of the water resources will not only affect groundwater. The Segura River is on top of the list of deteriorated rivers in Spain due to contamination and lack of water. The main pressure on the river system comes from the agricultural sector (pesticides and irrigation) and the inefficient treatment of wastewater. The Segura discharges only 4% of its flow to the sea. Due to the overexploitation of the resource, 2 In this report the Southeast Region of Spain is defined as the provinces of Alicante, Murcia and Almería. 3 INE: www.ine.es 4 downstream the river stays dry. In this way, the river loses its self-cleaning system of rivers with sufficient discharge. The contamination of the Segura could be transferred to the humans and generate risks for public health. The natural landscape disappears The natural landscape is threatened from two fronts. From the coast, tourist urbanizations are spreading and from the inner land, agriculture is expanding. Desertification and erosion are severe problems in the Southeast region of Spain. The overuse of groundwater could easily produce overexploitation of the aquifers, resulting in desertification. Nevertheless, in Murcia and Almería there is still irrigated agriculture inside areas with high risks of erosion, which accelerates the process of desertification. The land occupation by tourism and agriculture forms a threat for the protected areas. Part of the tourist constructions in the Southeast region of Spain occurs inside or near zones with a high ecological value. In this way, 14.000 hectares of protected areas in Murcia have been changed into building land. The landscape of Almería is transformed into a sea of plastics. Nearly 40% of the agriculture is already taking place underneath plastic. According to data from the Regional Ministry of the Environment of the Region of Andalusia, about 30% of the newly constructed greenhouses are illegal and do not comply with sanitary and environmental standards. The society is changing The Southeast region of Spain is a very rural zone with families working in agriculture. However the traditional family agriculture is being substituted by an industry of agricultural production by large companies which see the employees as expenses that should be reduced as much as possible. Moreover, the system of subsidies leads every year to problems of overproduction and the downfall of prices. The farmers’ incomes remain constant, but the expenses rise. As a result, the farmers save on the personal costs by contracting cheap workforces like (illegal) immigrants. A non-sustainable development WWF/Adena comes to the conclusion that one of the principal causes of the above problems is the lack of sustainable development4 in the Southeast region of Spain: • Lack of an equilibrated economic growth, because the agricultural incomes are not stable and because of the pressure on the landscape caused by tourism; • The natural resources are not used with prudence, nor is the environment being conserved: the aquifers are overexploited, there are desertification problems and the protected areas are threatened by the expansion of agriculture and tourism; • There is lack of solidarity within the society: many immigrants work in inadequate circumstances and there are not sufficient houses for them, while another part of the population enjoys the benefits of economic growth. 4 Following the principals of sustainable development defined by the Ministry of Environment. 5 The transfer will worsen the problems WWF/Adena thinks that the experience with the previous Tajo-Segura transfer should serve as a lesson to avoid making the same