The controversy caused by the German boycott of the Huelva strawberry in connection with the Doñana irrigation law, launched by the PP and Vox in Andalusia, is taking over the bulk of the electoral campaign of 23-J in Andalusia. Both the right and the left, with diametrically opposed perspectives, stir up the controversy to obtain the votes of the most populous community in Spain and the one that contributes the most deputies (61).
The Junta de AndalucÃa, governed by an absolute majority by the Popular Party, launched a bill that seeks to legalize irregular irrigation in the areas surrounding Doñana. The text, which went ahead without any parliamentary support other than that of Vox, has provoked criticism at the regional, national and international level, and repeated threats from Brussels with fines and other measures for considering it a “flagrant violation” of the ruling of the Court of EU of 2021 that forces Spain to end the over-extraction of water and to take concrete measures against illegal wells.
Most of the crops in this area are dedicated to red fruits, especially strawberries, and it is in Huelva, the province in which the Doñana National Park is located, where 98% of the national production of these fruits is concentrated. and about 30% in Europe.
This natural environment is badly damaged by drought, so granting licenses to new irrigating farmers who have been using water illegally for some time is something that most political parties, scientists and related sectors do not support, since it would irreparably damage both to Doñana as its aquifers.
This controversy, which does not seem to have an end to each step that is taken in the processing of the text, returned to the fore last week when those appearing in the Andalusian Parliament on the law were chosen and which did not include any person responsible for Doñana or any critical voice. The absences of the president of the Doñana Participation Council, Miguel Delibes, as well as of Eloy Revilla, director of the Biological Station of the National Park, were especially criticized.
So much was the commotion, that finally the PP agreed to include Delibes among those who will speak on the matter.
In this controversial context, the German association Campact launched a campaign with which it intends to gather 200,000 signatures to demand that the country’s supermarket chains stop selling strawberries from Spain so as not to contribute to the drying up of the National Park.
Supermarket chains such as Edeka and Lidl “contribute indirectly to the drying up of the Doñana National Park by selling strawberries from the drought,” said Friederike Gravenhorst, Campact’s campaign manager. “To grow cheap strawberries for Germany, Spain runs the risk of a drought disaster in one of its most important national parks.
This consumer association denounces that agricultural companies illegally pump water from the “already dried up” Doñana National Park, in order to supply strawberries to Germany and the rest of Europe even in winter. “Especially after the electoral success of the Popular Party in the elections” of 28M, “there is a danger that the theft of water will now become officially permitted,” the organization warned as justification for its campaign.
A few days after this boycott was made public, which had already collected more than 140,000 signatures, a delegation of European parliamentarians announced their visit to learn more about the drought, Doñana and strawberry cultivation. Such was the crossover of accusations that the delegation finally decided to cancel their visit while they were already in Spain “out of respect” for the electoral process and because of “the great political relevance that the issues of the trip have acquired in recent days in the face of the next Spanish national elections”, as they explained in a statement.
The war of accusations is taking place on all fronts. The Socialists believe that it was to be expected that the Doñana irrigation law would take its toll on the farmers and blame the PP for being the ones who are carrying out the text, and the popular ones blame the Government for giving wings to the boycott and the bad press in Andalusia .
First of all, Sánchez and the Third Vice President and Minister of Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, echoed the boycott of the Huelva strawberry on their social networks and accompanied it with messages that justified it. “Denialism ruins our environment and runs the risk of ruining local economies,” wrote the president, while Ribera published “Alert among German consumers who threaten a boycott of Spanish strawberries. It is essential to clear up any doubts: Juanma Moreno must immediately withdraw the irrigation law that threatens Doñanaâ€.
The PP’s reaction was immediate, accusing the Government of echoing the boycott on its social networks. “Pedro Sánchez’s evil against Andalusia knows no limits,” said the PP parliamentary spokesman, Toni MartÃn, who believes that the Prime Minister “has not surpassed the electoral result on Sunday and has launched openly to attack” the community .
After many statements in this sense, Moreno has written a letter to Pedro Sánchez on Wednesday asking him for the “cessation of the campaign of harassment” from his Executive against Huelva farmers and criticizing the “absolutely complicit position” of Sánchez and the third vice president of the Government before the “last defamatory campaign” against the sector of the red fruits of Huelva.
The community has traditionally been a barn of votes, since it is one of the most populous regions in the country, so it is not surprising that parties of different colors strive to scratch ballots for 23-J.
In this sense, the popular leader, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, was in Seville on Tuesday in a party board together with Juanma Moreno, asking the Andalusians to make one last effort in these elections to achieve the “democratic triplet”, in reference to because the PP already governs almost all the municipalities of the Andalusian capitals after 28-M, as well as the Junta de AndalucÃa with an absolute majority.
The second vice president of the Government, Yolanda DÃaz, has also been in Andalusia in an electoral act of Sumar. Specifically, the also Minister of Labor has gone to the epicenter of the controversy, where she has accused the PP of “deepening the ecological crime” and has stressed that the National Park is “right now a reference for the environmental crisis and the climate crisis in Spain”. .
The Socialists are not leaving the issue either and the Minister of Finance and Public Function and Deputy Secretary General of the PSOE, MarÃa Jesús Montero, has accused President Moreno this Wednesday of being “acting as an arsonist while trying to pretend that he has put on his helmet firefighter” in relation to the situation of the red fruit sector from Huelva.
