Conservation Issues
In recent years demand for water for agriculture in the area surrounding the park has reduced the amount of wetland. Overexploitation of water resources has caused the water-table to drop. The key aquifer ("aquifer 23") has not been able to refill because of the overuse of water created by the “Badajoz (irrigation) Plan” started in 1952, and of the administrative apathy and lack of suppleness faced with cereal farmers lobbies : indeed the quotas themselves (about 590 millions de m3 water / year attributed) correspond to nearly twice the amount of renewable water (about 320 millions of m3 / year available). ·
Faced with a possible fine from the EU, the Spanish Environment ministry presented in 1995 a transfer project (an aqueduct and miles of pipes between the Tagus and the Mancha Húmeda) to bring water to the upper Guadiana basin. This extra water was to be used strictly for urban water provision and for the protected ecological zones, not for agriculture. But this project was badly received for two main reasons. Firstly because it assumed that the two depleted aquifers had no chance of recovering, and it chose the easy and cheaper immediate solution with no account taken of future water resources. Secondly because it aimed at replacing the natural hydric system, a principle that is too anti-natural to be easily accepted. Various conservation groups expressed the view that the solution should be found within the Guadiana basin.
Various ecological groups have suggested that the national park's designation as a biosphere reserve (within Mancha Húmeda) should be withdrawn as its eco-system has been broken. In June 2008, a UNESCO report recommended that the national park lose its biosphere status or, alternatively, that Spain be given an ultimatum to reverse the degradation. In the event, Spain was given time to reverse the degradation.
A Special Upper Guadiana Plan concerning the western Mancha aquifers has been started in 2008 with a 5 M€ budget, to be operated for 29 years in order to restaure the wetlands. The European Union Water Directive demands wetlands to be in proper state by 2015 but it grants derogations in particularly difficult cases, as is so for the Tablas of Damiel in particular and the Mancha Húmeda in general - hence the 2027 limit date. This Plan consists of a water bank system that aims at attributing quotas on the basis of social and environmental grounds, taking into account the water use efficiency.
Analysis clearly show that there will be no notable improvement in the situation without considerably reducing the surface of irrigated cereals while maintaining without increase the surface of traditional crops suited to arid conditions (agricultura de secano in Spanish) and of horticulture (the latter being the most efficient crop in terms of extended water footprint). The Plan also includes buying water rights from cereal producers to attribute them back to illegal users, essentially small producers of vines and horticulture which have been found more efficient in water use and generate more income per cubic meter of water used.
The Spanish authorities expressed confidence that the situation would improve. Still, in the present crisis context funds are lacking for this operation. European subsidies are attributed in priority to reforesting land after forests were felled for the production of cereals during the preceding generations. Moreover, within the frame of Europe's present Common Agricultural Policy (in 2010) cereals get more subsidies than other crops. A revision of that politic is due in 2013. The choices that will be made then will be determinant for the future of the Mancha Húmeda. Another determining factor is the developing of other local economics, such as solar electricity, ecotourism, better quality in agricultural produces, and environmental services (carbon sinks for example).
In May 2009 a plan was announced to reverse the decline in the wetland area using recycled water. However, some scepticism was shown by environmentalists who noted that the aquifer was not going to be replenished.
In the hot summer of 2009 smouldering fires of the dry peat broke out in the area. Such fires were not a new phenomenon in the region; they had affected the peatlands alongside the Guadiana in previous years, but by reappearing in the National Park, the fires represented another symptom of the wetland's degradation.
Early in 2010 the situation was improved by heavier rainfall than had been experienced for several years.
Read more about this topic: Tablas De Daimiel National Park
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