Friday, March 29

Brussels threatens to fine Spain for the Andalusian government’s new plan to pardon irrigation in Doñana


Brussels has reacted to the second bill of PP and Vox to legalize irrigated crops with Doñana as it did a year ago with the first: throwing its hands up and threatening Spain with going to the Court of Justice of the EU and demand million-dollar sanctions if he allows the initiative defended by the Government of Juan Manuel Moreno to prosper.

WWF brings to Brussels the pardon for irrigation in Doñana for “openly rewarding” the illegal use of water

Further

The European Commission has warned the Government of Pedro Sánchez by letter of the risks it assumes if the Andalusian law, already registered in Parliament by urgent means, is approved “in the terms that have been announced”. The new text was known 20 days ago and, despite the fiery environmental discourse of the Junta de Andalucía (and the “diplomatic meetings” in the Belgian capital), Brussels perceives the same danger of lack of protection for the National Park.

The terms of the letter, dated March 17, are as harsh as the first time: “If the processing of this proposal prospers in the terms that have been announced, it would be producing a flagrant violation of the provisions of the Court’s ruling of Justice”, says the text, to which this newspaper has had access. And it adds: “Given this situation, the Commission would take into consideration the adoption of all the necessary measures, including the filing of a new appeal before the Court of Justice in which it would request that pecuniary sanctions be imposed.”

The department headed by the Third Vice President of the Government and Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, has received the letter from the European Commission and conveyed its concern to the President. The central Executive has already shown its resounding rejection of the second project to expand irrigated crops promoted by PP and Vox in Andalusia, and warned the Junta that it will file an appeal before the Constitutional Court if the rule is approved by the regional Parliament.

Sánchez plans to establish this same position during the debate on the motion of censure promoted by the extreme right that will be debated this Tuesday in Congress, according to ministry sources.

“Restlessness and stupefaction”

The speech that comes from Brussels is a blow to the waterline of the Government of Moreno, champion of the “green revolution” and the defense of the environment. The letter is signed by Florika Fink-Hooijer, a European official at the European Commission in charge of the General Directorate for the Environment, and sent to the Spanish ambassador to the EU, Marcos Alonso. She is the same person who already strongly reacted against the first Andalusian law proposal.

“The Commission has learned that on March 3, 2023, a new bill was presented to the Parliament of Andalusia, to be processed by the urgent procedure, which seeks to regularize illegal irrigated crops in the area of Doñana”, says the letter. Fink-Hooijer refers to his previous letter, dated January 31, 2022, and recalls that already then he conveyed “the concern and astonishment of the Commission at the risk that a similar proposal, presented on January 11, 2022, posed for the execution of the judgment of the Court of Justice of the EU of June 24, 2021”.

He was referring to the condemnation of the European justice to Spain for not having limited the illegal extractions of underground water in Doñana. In that opinion, the European Court concluded that the Government should have adopted measures much earlier to avoid the alteration of the protected natural habitat, threatened by the cultivation of red fruits, a cornerstone of the economy in the Huelva region. The new letter repeats the idea that “The Kingdom of Spain had not yet adopted all the necessary measures to comply with the provisions of the sentence as soon as possible.”

The technicians of the General Directorate for the Environment of the EU are now analyzing the report of the Spanish Government on the actions undertaken to protect Doñana and comply with the sentence, especially “accelerating the control and inspection actions that ensure the closure and sealing of all the illegal wells that persist in the surroundings of the Natural Park”. Brussels even offers to finance through European Next Generation funds “projects for the digitization and measurement of water abstractions in Doñana”.

Between 700 and 1,600 hectares of illegal irrigation

The first bill promoted by PP, Ciudadanos and Vox in February 2022, also urgently, to pardon crops that depleted the Natural Park aquifer sparked an immediate reaction from Brussels. A week after learning about the text, the letter arrived threatening to impose million-dollar sanctions on Spain. By launching this second initiative with the same objective, with new shelters behind the PP and Vox parliamentary groups, the Moreno government trusted that the European Commission would react in a different way. “They received bad information,” said the spokesman for the Board and Minister of the Environment. But it has not been that way.

“The approval of a proposal similar to the one presented on March 3 would significantly aggravate the situation of the bodies of water and the protected areas of Doñana,” the European official subscribed. The letter ends by giving one month for the Spanish authorities to respond with “explanations and clarifications” pertinent. “In particular,” she concludes, “I would ask you to tell me how you have made sure or plan to make sure that the irrigation improvement plan will not have lasting detrimental effects on the integrity of the protected areas of Doñana.”

On March 3, the Andalusian PP registered in the Chamber its new bill for “the improvement of the management of agricultural areas of the County of Huelva”, a rule that opens the door to the reclassification of some 1,600 hectares as agricultural crops. irrigation in the northern crown of Doñana. The initiative, also signed by Vox, was registered urgently, halving the processing times for its approval in this period of sessions, very close to the municipal elections.

electoral promises

The first was registered a few months after the regional elections, which Moreno won with an absolute majority. PP and Vox compete dog-facedly for the electorate in this Huelva region, with an economy highly dependent on strawberry irrigation, and also elbowing some socialist mayors aligned with the same proposal as the popular ones.

The new proposal, like the previous one, addresses the reordering of the northern crown of the Doñana National Park to regularize soils that were cultivated years ago, but ceased to be so as a consequence of the territorial design made by the then socialist Executive of Andalusia: some 1,600 hectares according to the Board; 700 according to the PSOE-A. Around 10,000 workers depend on the reclassification of these lands, and on a subsequent irrigation permit authorized by the Guadalquivir Hydrographic Confederation, dependent on the central government.

The Executive of Pedro Sánchez has opposed the second bill with the same vehemence that it did the first time, despite the fact that the PP has modified the wording to try to scare away the doubts of Madrid and Brussels about the preservation of the Park Natural. The new bill adds contributions that the PSOE-A made during the processing of the first law -the creation of a technical office that reviews the affected hectares on a case-by-case basis- and also “a cut and paste” (in the words of the PP). of the proposal of the Ministry of Ecological Transition to put the Andalusian norm under the umbrella of the Forestry Law at state level.

The popular subordinate the future expansion of irrigation to the completion of some hydraulic works that guarantee surface water, “never from the Doñana aquifer”, which is now being depleted by many of the affected farmers.

These water transfer works, desalination plants, etc. -among them the Alcolea dam and the San Silvestre tunnel- have not started, not even the administrative bidding process. Furthermore, in the case of the Alcolea dam, an Environment report determined that the water is contaminated and therefore cannot be used to irrigate crops.



www.eldiario.es