White smoke. The central government and the Andalusian Government have reached, after weeks of negotiations, an agreement on Doñana signed by the Minister of Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, and the Andalusian president, Juanma Moreno. With the agreement reached, the Board withdraws its controversial parliamentary initiative to regularize some 1,900 hectares of illegal irrigation while the central government promises to allocate an additional 350 million to the sustainable development of the Doñana environment. The pact seeks to stop the over-extraction of water from this natural enclave, achieve the recovery of this space in a critical situation and provide a response to the fact that there are farmers who invoke non-existent historical water rights.
The agreement for Doñana signed in Almonte (Huelva) includes total investments of more than 1,400 million euros to guarantee sustainable development in 14 municipalities around the park between 2023 and 2027.
The central government will contribute 350 million, in addition to the 356 million committed to environmental actions a year ago, while the Board will contribute 700 million.
“These are unimaginable figures, which must be well invested,” highlighted the minister.
The agreement is a response by elevation that seeks social peace by giving a way out of the problem of the approximately 600 families of the Northern Crown of Doñana with illegal irrigation who, according to the Board “were found in a certain legal limbo and saw their livelihood threatened.” future.” In reality, these families transformed rainfed or forest lands into irrigation outside the so-called Strawberry Pact, which wanted to make a clean slate of these illegalities and regularize only irrigation from before 2004.
“We had a commitment to these families and it is fair to recognize their effort and generosity, also in accepting the agreement,” said Moreno.
Specifically, all farmers in the Doñana area who wish to do so will receive aid of 100,000 euros per hectare, which they will collect in five years, at a rate of 20,000 euros per year, in exchange for stopping cultivating their land, renaturalizing the soil or reforesting it to leave it in its original state.
Of this aid of 100,000 euros, Moreno specified, the majority, 70,000 euros, will be provided by the central government, while the Board will allocate 20,000 euros and the Huelva Provincial Council will add another 10,000, in an agreement that will lead to the withdrawal of the project. irrigation law of the Board.
Farmers who do not want to stop farming may also choose to convert their farms into dry farming or organic production, but in this case, Moreno specified, the aid will be “quite minor.”
Minister Ribera indicated that the agreed solution is not a temporary response “to a small group of interests” represented by illegal irrigators, but rather “it is a broad program for all residents of the area of ??influence of Doñana.”
The Andalusian president said that this is a very beneficial pact. “We had a commitment to those families, and we must recognize their effort and generosity in accepting the agreement. “Everyone wins, no one loses. The neighbors, the city councils, the area organizations, the environmental entities win…” said Moreno.
He also highlighted that the agreement will benefit not only the five municipalities involved in the entire debate (which gave rise to the parliamentary initiative), but will affect the 14 municipalities in the Doñana area of ??influence.
The dispute entered the process of being resolved through a pre-agreement between both administrations reached a month and a half ago. The Board decided to temporarily withdraw the bill to legitimize illegal irrigation and the Government put on the table the commitment to invest 350 million euros in a plan called Framework of actions for sustainable territorial development in the area of ??influence of the National Park of Doñana.. “This amount will go to the promotion of territorial and economic development activities that are compatible with the preservation of Doñana, to new initiatives or to modernize or adapt existing ones,” Hugo Morán, Secretary of State for the Environment, explained to this newspaper. .
The new plan adds to the framework of actions that the central Administration is already carrying out in Doñana (with a budget also of 350 million) to defend its water resources. They are investments that were launched to solve the degradation of this place (recovery of water courses, replacement of underground flows with surface waters, elimination of underground exploitations or closure of illegal wells…) and they are the response to the infringement opened by the EU and the condemnation of the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, among other international pressures.
When the pre-agreement was announced, it was said that the lines of action have yet to be identified, but the initiatives can cover areas such as agriculture, livestock or even tourism or education, since the plan is presented as “an endowment of the of the Government” and not just of the Ministry, Morán explained. Those 350 million is an “investment ceiling”, although everything may end up depending on the territory’s capacity to generate investment projects.
“We cannot continue in a scenario that goes further in the depletion (of the aquifer) that Doñana already suffers as a consequence of the pressures caused by human activities, aggravated by climate change. Resources are decreasing and there can be no increasing pressure. Activity and employment must be created without being subject to the dynamics of climate change,” says the Secretary of State.
The bill announced at the time by the PP-A and Vox sought to regularize some 1,900 hectares (by granting titles of irrigable agricultural land to land that had been left out of the so-called Strawberry Pact of 2004, classified today as rainfed or forestry), according to WWF.
Multiple factors could have influenced the decision taken by the Board, but especially the growing pressure from the European Commission, which has warned of the risk that the ruling of the European Court of Justice could become a million-dollar fine against Spain for failing to comply with European directives. that force him to protect Doñana.
“Let’s not forget that this whole situation can also harm the strawberry sector, at a time when marketing contracts are being negotiated,” says Juanjo Carmona, spokesperson for WWF, which has started these complaint campaigns in Europe about the use unsustainable risk water in Huelva. “No one can be immune to these warnings,” say the central Administration.
Doñana’s “sustainable development” plan will logically respect the legitimate rights of farmers with allocated water resources, but it seeks to make it clear that in Doñana “we have reached the limit of irrigated growth capacity”, so “we must explore other ways,” Hugo Morán said then.
The Doñana national park is now subject to a kind of “assisted breathing” regime since it receives external water resources from other basins (Tinto-Odiel-Piedras), which is atypical for a natural space that must be recognized for its own values. natural that it treasures.
“We want to comply with the ruling of the European Court of Justice and give stability to the brand of Doñana products, an issue that worries farmers at a time when the sustainability of their mode of production is being questioned,” concludes the Secretary of State. .
As soon as it became known that the Board’s intention was to expand irrigation, the central government expressed its strong protest. And he was not left alone. Their criticism was supported by European authorities and even UNESCO, among other institutions, as well as environmental groups. Juanma Moreno’s Executive claimed to act in favor of farmers, but there were also representatives of this sector who protested against the project, since it could affect the park’s ecosystem. x.
In order for the negotiation to reach a successful conclusion, the president of the Board, Juanma Moreno, suspended the processing of the bill in Parliament and opened a period of one month to build bridges between the opposing parties and, in his words, “ always listening to the farmers.” The time scheduled for negotiation ran out a couple of weeks ago and, with the deadline, so did the patience of environmental defenders, who finally saw how the imminent signing of an agreement was announced yesterday. Doñana, they say, “cannot wait any longer.”
Before the public presentation of the agreement, the president of the Doñana participation council, Miguel Delibes, at the suggestion of the Board, has called the members of the council to a meeting to inform them of its content at the Salvador Távora theater in Almonte ( Huelva).
To reach the pact, a working group was created that met on October 9 and, from then until now, has held meetings and received contributions from the different economic and social agents of the region to seek a solution that is as consensual as possible. possible.
As indicated at the time, the agreement will be similar to that of the Technical Office of the Mar Menor (Murcia) and will have the objective of marking priority actions and protecting the ecosystem along with the socioeconomic conditions in the area.
After the month of deadline, representatives of the Junta de Andalucía and the Government have called for caution on several occasions and have always been optimistic about the possibility of reaching an agreement.
The Platform in Defense of County Irrigation, which represents the farmers who would benefit from this new regulation that was brought to Parliament, requested a few days ago that the initiative return to the Andalusian Chamber for debate and approval, a request to which Vox joined.