The extension of space of the Natura 2000 Network in the Llobregat delta proposed by the Generalitat does not ensure the conservation of birds that Europe demands, according to a technical opinion commissioned by the Institut Agrícola. The business organization is opposed to this growth because, if it goes ahead, it considers that it will jeopardize the activity of the majority of its 250 local associates. The document, signed by ornithologist Jordi Sargatal, one of the most renowned experts in the field, limits the extension to certain areas, excluding high-yield farms, and warns that the key to success lies in the management of the areas already protected.
The Special Zone for the Protection of Birds (ZEPA), of 935 hectares, would grow to 2,021 hectares, according to the proposal presented by the Government last June in response to the letter of summons that the European Commission sent two years ago. Under threat of sanction, it warned that the environmental value of the Delta was not being cared for and urged action to be taken. However, the proposed extension, affirms the opinion commissioned by the agricultural employers, “does not guarantee at all the increase in the species of wintering ducks and the 23 vertebrates dealt with in the letter”. In the opinion of its author, “it is necessary, above all and urgently, a management plan for the current protected areas (…) that can guarantee the reproduction, feeding, wintering and rest during the migrations of many species”.
According to Sargatal, who was director of the Aiguamolls de l’Empordà natural park from its creation, in 1984, until 1998, “the way to improve its populations is not to double the hectares of ZEPAs, and even less if, as is the case, They are agricultural areas. The naturalist points out that “if the extension were made to other wetlands, perhaps yes, doubling the area could double populations.” But it is not what the Generalitat has proposed, he specifies, since “the expansion would be carried out mainly on agricultural areas.” And he insists: “What is needed, as a priority, is to improve the management of wetlands already protected and included in the current ZEPAs.”
A special case, Sargatal specifies, is the one that affects the five species most closely linked to cultivation areas. “Here -he maintains- their presence and conservation also depend mainly on the management of certain areas, both agricultural and flood-prone meadows, rather than increasing the agricultural area within the ZEPAs”. In addition, adds the expert, “there are some species (another four) that depend a lot on the state of their populations in areas totally unrelated to the Delta.”
Sargatal delimits the extension to the areas claimed by Europe, which are the wetlands and the beach of Ca l’Arana and the new channel of the Llobregat. The ornithologist details that the proposal of the Generalitat, “has been made with criteria of territorial coherence in some places, to complete the current protected areas in others, or to re-seat them between them, as for example in the fields of Cal Nani and Dominguet, or in the area of ??Els Llanassos, and along the entire coastline”. Instead, he warns, “in Cal Inglada, Casa Grogra and the Burés páramos, as well as in the Ràfols area, the ZEPA declaration is proposed in high-yield agricultural areas, which can cause certain misunderstandings and incompatibilities.” Here lies the conflict with the owners of the fields, since they see the conditions that this protection would impose on them to continue working them competitively as incompatible. A large part of the vegetable crops could not be maintained, they say, nor could the installation, for example, of greenhouses, in many cases essential.
The opinion defends that “it would surely be more productive in order to maintain and increase biodiversity in the Delta to establish agreements with properties to make agricultural production compatible with the production of certain species of fauna, particularly within the already protected area and subject to limitations.” , and that could even be financially compensated in the same way that vegetable crops are paid for”. Sargatal recalls that “the Llobregat delta must be a place that is agriculturally productive and ecologically alive, a model of how to make these two objectives compatible, which many other similar places on the European continent can also follow.”
