Irrigation water, a vital element for rice production, has been halved in the Ebro delta due to the drought. The Hydrographic Confederation of the Ebro (CHE) has announced a 50% cut in the allocation to the two irrigation communities, up to 250 hm³ for the two deltaic banks, with a week to go before the expected campaign of the rice
The unprecedented decision makes the 2023 rice campaign the most uncertain in history. The two communities of irrigators have very quickly, separately, designed a plan with the aim of guaranteeing the supply of water from the Ebro river to the rice fields until the end of August. If the plant ran out of water at the beginning of July, with the rice still in the middle of its growth phase, part of the harvest could be lost, even 100% in the worst case.
To avoid this, the two irrigation communities have designed their own strategy, adapted to the characteristics of each of the two hemidelts and the two canals. These are plans that can be modified on the fly depending on the evolution of the drought and the restrictions applied by the CHE. It is also an unprecedented scenario, without previous experiences, which adds complexity to the rice campaign and the management of irrigation water.
The Irrigation Community of the Right of the Ebro will opt, as it announced yesterday, to make intermittent water cuts to the canal for periods of ten days in a row. When it does bring water, the channel will carry 100% of the planned endowment. In this way, it is hoped to be able to guarantee irrigation throughout the campaign despite having half of the year’s supply without restrictions due to the drought.
Having 50% of water has also changed the first day of opening of the Canal de la Dreta de l’Ebre, scheduled for Monday. It will take place five days later, on April 28. The cycles of ten days without water will alternate until the evolution of the restrictions is seen.
The strategy of the Canal de l’Esquerra de l’Ebre, which maintains the date of April 28 for the opening, already planned, is very different. Intermittent cuts will not be made, but measures will be introduced to spend much less water and be able to irrigate all the rice paddies even though it has half the allocation. They will also adapt to the drought scenario, with the hope that rains will arrive in the Ebro river basin during the spring.
One factor plays in favor of the Ebro rice farmers. More and more fields are sown dry, a growing trend in recent years for various reasons; one of which, the fight against the apple snail pest. There are paddy fields that are already doing dry sowing these days, which allows the seeds to be injected into the ground and to be able to spend the first month without water. Dry sowing, which is more expensive and more complex, is more favorable to the new situation because it saves an entire month of water. In 2022, a third of the planting in the Delta was already done dry.
The majority of paddy fields in the Ebro delta, however, are still flooded first, after the opening of the canals scheduled for next Friday, and sowing is done with the fields full of water. When they have been flooded, one of the keys is to have the salinity of the water well controlled in an environment as close to the sea as the deltaic plain. With the contribution of water reduced by half, one of the risks is that the salt will rise and kill the rice plant, so that it would damage a large part of the production.
The Ebro delta sows 21,000 hectares of rice every year. The two cooperatives (Cambra Arrossera del Montsià and Arrossaires del Delta de l’Ebre) produce 60% of the total rice in Catalonia.
