Farmers protest Madrid’s water conservation plan for Tagus river

By Alyssa McMurtry

OVIEDO, Spain (AA) – Hundreds of farmers and politicians protested in front of Spain’s Environment Ministry building on Wednesday, clamoring for the government to backtrack on its plans to conserve water in the Tagus river.

The Tagus is the longest river in the Iberian Peninsula and the only Spanish river without minimum flow thresholds to ensure it does not dry up.

Spain’s central government has recently decided to establish those minimum water levels for Tagus, which will gradually increase until 2027.

Currently, a significant amount of the river’s water is diverted southward to the Segura River, which provides water to Alicante, Murcia and Almeria in southeast of Spain.

In the case of low water levels, Madrid’s plan could dramatically affect these areas.

To further complicate matters, those areas make up what is dubbed as “Europe’s garden.” They use that water to produce most of Spain’s fruit and vegetable exports.

Without the water from the Tagus, the agricultural union SCRATS estimates that crops could be reduced by as much as 50% and around 15,000 jobs would be destroyed.

Teresa Ribera, the minister in charge of the plan, said the government is complying with five separate Supreme Court rulings, which force the government to establish ecological protection. She also said the project will help Spain adapt to climate change, which has already increased the frequency of droughts in the country.

The government’s plan suggests that more expensive desalination plants could be used to substitute the river water.

Yet even politicians from the government’s own party in Valencia have aligned with more conservative parties in Murcia and Andalusia to push back against the plan.

“We are open to dialogue because confrontation and water wars won't help anyone. We need to find new meeting points and defend the interests of irrigators and Valencia,” said Socialist President of Valencia Ximo Puig.