Tíjola is in Alto Almanzora, 700 meters above sea level; right between the Filabres mountain range and the Estancia mountain range. 35 degrees in summer, minimums around zero in winter. Esparto grass, rosemary, thyme, mastic. Some scattered pine forest. Little water, very little.
Its water balance is negative almost all year round and, if it were not for the historical overexploitation of the aquifer and the Tajo-Segura transfer, nothing would grow except some almond trees, a little cereal and a handful of scattered olive trees.
That is why the idea of hectares and hectares of olive trees under intensive irrigation is so strange.
Rare, but not impossible. In fact, according to the Almeria Ecologist Coordinatoris what is being done. SAT Olisurwhich has been working for years in the use of water resources, is carrying out the implementation of 14 hectares of irrigation.
Something that, beyond the controversy, is above all an example that the big question of the moment is: at what price will those olive trees be grown? What impacts will be hidden behind intensive production in vulnerable areas?
The end of an era. For thousands of years, olive trees have grown in the Mediterranean basin. It is a dry crop, with moderate densities and very close to the ground. The problem is that, in recent years, it has stopped being profitable.
The best example is Andalusia. In the south of Spain, “good harvests have been obtained with 400mm per year.” However, in 2023 there are Andalusian dryland areas “that have not received even 200mm.” It was a catastrophe: a catastrophe that threatens to be repeated year after year.
For this reason, more and more producers want to switch to irrigation. Because “dry” means “watered with what falls” and “irrigation” is “having water assured.” And the olive grove is good business, if you can water it.
“The difficult thing is to have water because the Guadalquivir basin is already in deficit, so new concessions are not given,” explained Diego Barrancor a few years ago. Hence the olive trees are “fleeing” the Guadalquivir.
And they go where they can. To Almería, for example.
The diffuse limits of agricultural extractivism. The case of SAT Olisur is complex because, even if it seems like a bad idea, it is a company that has been working in the area for almost 30 years; who tries to survive with very bad cards.
But not all cases are like this. In recent years, We have seen how ghost companies are dedicated to lease land, drain its resources and move on to the next thing. Agrarian extractivism is the order of the day and the conflict it’s inevitable. The crazy idea of installing irrigated olive trees in Almería is simply an anecdote of an immense problem.
The problem is that, as Hannah Arendt said, it is never easy to know the difference between a refuge and a trap.
Image | WineCountry Media
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