Drought peaks in Spain: “Like a desert”

It has hardly rained in parts of Spain for months. Water is rationed, farmers fear for their livelihoods. Because of the climate crisis, agriculture will probably have to rethink. A government summit is taking place today.

Everything is beige and dried up. Instead of a reservoir: thick cracks in the bone-dry ground. Images that are otherwise known from drought belts in Africa and Asia – they have also become reality in large parts of Spain.

In a field in Albacete, around 260 kilometers south-east of Madrid, a few green sprouts of wheat are still sticking out of the ground. Juan Cebrian from the Young Farmers’ Association holds a few of them in his hands. Then he waves it away.

“The spike that comes out is very small, very faint,” says Cebrian. The root does not grow, it dries up. “So we have to consider almost the entire season of cereals and legumes in our region as lost.”

Harvest season partly lost

More than 3.5 million hectares of cultivated land have been lost in Spain, according to the Federation of Farmers and Livestock Breeders. Wheat and barley in the south of the country could fail completely this year. Fruits are also affected – especially stone fruit now in spring.

In some regions and cities, water is so scarce that it has to be rationed. “If there is no more water, that means for us that we will hardly earn anything,” says Santiago Cuadevilla from Catalonia.

Spain is working flat out to find other water sources, for example with recycled water – i.e. wastewater that is treated or seawater that is desalinated. But that is complex and costs more, says Tomas Azcarate. He works for the National Research Council.

Impact on consumer prices

“Obviously, both desalinated water and recycled water are more expensive,” says Azcarate. This also affects the production costs. “And the higher the cost, the higher the prices that European consumers will soon have to pay for Spanish fruit and vegetables.”

However, it is also a question of time whether and for how long the current products can still be cultivated in Spain. Azcarate demands that agriculture as a whole must rethink. “Because climate change,” he says, “is not from the day after tomorrow, it is from tomorrow. If not actually today!”

It must now be a matter of developing other cultivation methods, says Azcarate – or relying on varieties that grow better in dry areas.

UNESCO title threatened

The discussions about it split the country. Entire regions in Spain depend on agriculture, and there is currently a major dispute over the cultivation of strawberries in Andalusia.

Around the Donana National Park, the conservative regional government wants to push through a law that would legalize the irrigation of around 500 hectares of cultivated land. Environmental protection organizations and the opposition are sounding the alarm.

In front of the cameras, MP Maribel Mora poured a cup of sand on the Andalusian Prime Minister’s parliamentary chair – and threatened: “This is what Donana will look like – like a desert!”

Should the law pass, the EU is threatening sanctions – and UNESCO is warning against deleting the national park from the World Heritage List.