A WWF investigation has estimated that the PP and Vox bill being processed in the Andalusian Parliament to "order" illegal irrigation in the area of Doñana could benefit an area of up to 1,903.7 hectares, that is, much more than double the hectares suggested by its promoters, although somewhat vaguely (some 750 hectares and 650 farms have been indicated).
WWF, an NGO that once promoted the protection of this natural area, has carried out an investigation which concludes that, contrary to what the Junta de Andalucía argues, the illegal farms subject to this amnesty "became irrigated after of the approval in 2004 of the Land Management Plan for the Doñana Area (POTAD), that is, "with full knowledge that they were illegal in terms of land management and that they had no legal right to water."
This inquiry indicates that the 1,903.7 illegal hectares, an area equivalent to some 2,000 soccer fields, located in the municipalities of Almonte, Bonares, Lucena del Puerto, Moguer and Rociana del Condado would benefit from this law.
WWF has been monitoring the changes and evolution of these irrigation systems using satellite images for more than a decade.
The organization denounces that none of these hectares have any legal right to land or water, so they should be reverted to their previous state and their owners punished.
The surface of 1,903.7 hectares that are illegally irrigated outside the irrigable agricultural area of the Special Plan come from two types of soil: dryland agricultural and forestry. In both cases, they are illegal transformations between 2004 and 2014.
With the de facto modification of the Strawberry Plan (which the administrations agreed to order in their day) promoted by the party of President Moreno Bonilla and Vox, a total of 1432.4 hectares officially classified as dry land would be legalized but which began to be irrigated sometime between 2004 and 2014 and that would be rewarded with this conversion into irrigable agricultural land.
"Illegals will not need to meet any more requirements," denounces WWF
It would not even be required that the exploitation has continued over time or that they have not had administrative files or convictions, since "with the current wording of the proposed Law, a single irrigation campaign between the years mentioned would be enough to cease to be a dry land and pass to irrigated land ", adds this organization. The beneficiaries would see the market value of these lands multiplied up to ten times.
Faced with the lack of technical data and a planimetry of the proposed Law and the various figures offered by the interested parties that support the initiative itself, the WWF analysis shows that "since 2004, the year in which the POTAD (the plan that orders the territory in Doñana and establishes the limits where new irrigated crops are not allowed), the irrigated hectares multiplied, knowing the illegals that they were violating the law and that they would have to illegally extract water from the aquifer to cultivate strawberries and red berries.
In fact, according to the evidence obtained by WWF during the investigation, 70% of these rainfed hectares had never been irrigated before POTAD.
WWF's research also shows that the anti-Doñana law could lead to the modification of the Andalusian Forest Law and thereby legalize up to 471.3 illegal hectares in forest area.
The spokespersons deem this fact especially painful, since they are "areas where farmers deliberately uprooted the masses of trees to plant illegal crops of strawberries and red berries". The bill reclassifies these hectares first as agricultural land and, as they began to be irrigated between 2004 and 2014, converts them, in a second step, into irrigated agricultural land.
"With this law, the government of President Moreno Bonilla will increase the irrigated area and therefore the pressure on the exhausted Doñana, as the European Commission has reproached him," explains Juan Carlos del Olmo, WWF Secretary General.
“In this way, the illegals are allowed to continue stealing water and profiting from an overexploited aquifer, while they wait for surface water that does not exist (from the transfer of Tinto, Odiel and Piedras), adds Del Olmo.
"In addition, this law would definitively legalize the transformation of hundreds of forest and rainfed hectares of high value for biodiversity into crops under plastic," explains Juan Carlos del Olmo, WWF general secretary.
“The anti-Doñana law is unacceptable, it is a mockery for honest farmers and a prize for illegal ones who deliberately violate the laws and for whom a non-existent right is recognized that they have not proven in court, and it will mean a huge speculative business since that the value of their rainfed lands will multiply”, affirms Juan Carlos del Olmo
