drought

the ghost of drought has not yet gone away

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Spain’s reservoirs accumulate water. Quite. The balance published on Monday by the Government shows that the water reserve is at 73.4% of its capacity, which is equivalent to about 41,100 cubic hectometers (hm3), almost 3,000 more than last year and 9,300 than the average of the last decade. Now, that does not mean that Spain can breathe free from the specter of water cuts. On the contrary. Reserves have been declining for months while warnings echo of those who remember that droughts must be solved with the swamps still full. There is a revealing fact: the water reserve has been reducing since may and Galicia activated weeks ago the pre-alert for “moderate shortages” in several areas. The percentage: 73.4%. That is the level of occupancy of the reservoirs. He last balance from the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge (Miteco) shows that the swamps of peninsular Spain, with a capacity of 56,042 hm3, currently store 41,110. If we go down to detail we see that there are areas in which the stock is much higher and others in which it is clearly lower. In Júcar the reserves are at 60.8% and in Galicia-Costa at 65.2% while in the internal basins of the Basque Country or Catalonia they exceed 85%. In general, the Atlantic side remains at 74.8% and the Mediterranean side is around 68.8%. Is it a bad balance? No. Not at least if we take into account the panorama that Spain faced in other years at this point in the summer. At the end of July 2025, the country’s dams they remained at 68.4%with just over 38,300 hm3 of water, and there were certain regions in which the outlook was very worrying. The water reserve stored in the Segura basin It didn’t even reach 29%when now exceeds 56%. In general, Miteco itself recognizes that the dammed water is higher than that of a year ago and the average for the last decade, which is at 31,831 hm3. This is the case in both the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. It’s not all good news. No. And that’s probably the most important part. Perhaps the current water outlook is not bad, especially if we compare it with that of recent years, but there is one fact that cannot be omitted either: reserves have been declining for months and there is no hope of that changing. In fact, this negative trend can be traced back to May 19, when Miteco calculated that the reservoirs were above the 84% of its capacity. A month later that indicator had already dropped to 80.1% and on Monday it was at 73.4%. Dams that empty. A quick Google search comes up to find news about swamps that are slowly emptying. It happens with the Ciudad Real reservoirs and Salamanca or in Andalusia and Estremadurato cite a handful of examples. In Galicia the Xunta even went one step further and opted two weeks ago for activating the “pre-alert for moderate water shortage” in the Lérez and Anllóns and Costa da Coruña river systems up to the border with Arteixo. In Vigo have activated also the pre-alert. There at the beginning of the month the mayor, Abel Caballero, assured that there was water for five months and that its main dam, Eiras, has fewer reserves than it accumulated around the same time in 2017, the year in which the region suffered one of its worst droughts. How is that possible? Very easy, due to the peculiar meteorology that Spain is encountering this year. The winter was very rainy. So much so that Miteco calculates that it was the eighth with the most rainfall since it began collecting data on the subject, in 1961. So far in the 21st century there has only been two others in which the most water was collected, 2000-2001 and 2009-2010. This explains why in March the reservoirs accumulated just over 46,800 hm3 of water for human, agricultural and industrial consumption, 83.5% of its capacity. In the entire historical series there is no March with a better indicator. From that stage we went to a spring particularly “dry”during which 75% of what has been normal for that season between 1991 and 2020 was collected on the peninsula. In June the change was even more radical. The Aemet calculates that the average precipitation in peninsular Spain was just 12.4 mm“which represents 39% of the normal value for the month,” he clarifies. In the historical archive From the agency there are only two Junes in which the umbrella was less needed. “It is worth thinking about the drought”. It is not about being catastrophic with the reservoirs at 73.4% of its capacity, but it is advisable to keep in mind reflections such as the one I left in April in The Conversation Jorge Rodríguez-Chueca, professor at the Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM). Despite the good water reserve data that Spain had at that time, the expert warned: “It is at this time when it is appropriate to think about the drought.” The reason is very simple: strategies must be drawn up when there is still water in the swamps, not when we have dragged on for months with hardly any rain. date hm3 of dammed water Water reserve (%) 05/19/2026 47,178 84.2 06/02/2026 46,593 83.1 06/16/2026 45,672 81.5 06/30/2026 43,955 78.4 06/14/2026 42,192 75.3 06/21/2026 41,110 73.4 The other figure: 32,000 hm3. Although the copious winter rains had allowed Spain leave behind the state of drought that the country has been dragging since 2021Rodríguez-Chueca insisted: “It is now, when the reservoirs are full, when the drought must be addressed through planning and awareness.” “The amount of water impounded is only a specific image, not a guarantee for the future,” insisted the UPM expert before slipping in a key piece of information: Spain’s annual consumption is around 32,000 hm3. “Drought does not appear suddenly, it is a cumulative process. If consumption remains high, the system may seem safe. But if it also rains less, … Read more

60 years ago they sank a thousand-year-old church in a reservoir in Barcelona. Only the drought has brought it back to the surface

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He Sau swampin the Osona region (Barcelona), has a surprise: when the drought hits, lowering the level of the reservoir enough, it reveals a superb stone bell tower that has been submerged since 1962. The tower belongs to Sant Romà de Sau, a Romanesque church from the 11th century that the Franco regime sank (normally up to 23 meters deep) to supply water to Barcelona In fact, during the pressing crisis of 2023, the drought left it completely grounded, as NASA photographed from spaceThe fact that it is more than a thousand years old and still standing even though it lives submerged is commendable, but it is also the oldest church in the world that is still standing in water. according to the Official World Record. Once upon a church (and a town) submerged in a swamp. More specifically, the church of Sant Romà de Sau is in the Lombard Romanesque style and was consecrated in the year 1061. It was originally built with a single nave oriented from east to west and with a square bell tower three-story semi-detachedprecisely the one that can be seen when there is drought. The church that It is normally submerged at a depth of 23 meters It is not exactly the original: it has been accumulating interventions, such as a reform and expansion after the damage of an earthquake or a remodeling in the 19th century, when the apse was demolished and the orientation of the temple was changed. The bell tower is the vestige of what was once there: the church of a town that was also submerged. The settlement of Sant Romà data 917. Before the water level rose and flooded everything, there they lived 300 inhabitants in the middle of the 20th century who were dedicated to agriculture, livestock and forestry. That of Sant Romà is another story of towns submerged after the execution of the hydraulic project, which led to the expropriation of homes and agricultural farms, its inhabitants had to leave their home without taking part in the matter or receiving compensation. Context. The water that reaches the Catalan capital comes mainly from the Ter and Llobregat rivers through a network of reservoirs. In the case of the Ter, specifically the reservoirs of Sau and those of Susqueda and Pastry. The metropolitan area of ​​Barcelona suffered significant demographic growth during Franco’s development, so the infrastructure was no longer adequate. The construction of the reservoir falls precisely within those years, although the original project goes back to 1931 and the works did not begin until 1942. As the professor and director of the Department of History at the University of Santiago de Compostela Daniel Lanero explains to Newtral.es, what the Franco regime did was “give continuity to the hydraulic policy that had been put into practice since the end of the 19th century.” Beatriz García, professor of contemporary history at the University of León, explains the two bases of this water resources management policy: general plan of irrigation canals and swamps of 1902 and the national hydraulic works plan approved in the Second Republic. Why is it important. That this church breaks conservation records in such complicated conditions does not mean that it is eternal: in 1999 it was already had to be restored after decades under water due to the weakness of its structure. In any case, the church of Sant Romà de Sau is a clear example of the “submerged heritage“, a category in which archeology and cultural law have been trying to regulate for decades. without much success. The sinking of Sant Romà and its church is not an isolated case but a common practice of the Franco regime: the construction of reservoirs during the dictatorship led to the displacement of tens of thousands of people from their towns in a traumatic process of forced displacement of rooted places for its population. In the Spanish state alone there are about 500 towns that were swallowed up by the water due to the construction of dams and reservoirs. In Xataka | In World War II, a town in Lithuania buried its bell to protect it from the Nazis. They did not find it until 2024 In Xataka | For 60 years, a farmer with no idea about architecture built a cathedral from scratch in Madrid. The bureaucracy has closed it Cover | joan ggk and Quico Llach

Since we cannot solve the drought, we are creating plants that are 100% resistant to it.

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Five amino acids. For 450 million years, everything has depended on five amino acids. A team led by the Blas Cabrera Institute of Chemistry-Physics has managed to identify the ‘minimal molecular code’ that determines how plants perceive and respond to water stress. In fact, using crystallography and mutagenesis techniques, they have mapped the evolutionary history of that receptor. What’s more, they have shown that it can be rewritten. What is water stress? It is, in essence, something key for plants: the hormonal apparatus of plants uses abscisic acid to detect when they have to activate or not activate procedures to calibrate responses to water restrictions. We discovered how these receivers worked 19 years ago and, until now, we have not been able to obtain a commercial version that has benefited from this knowledge. This is what the IQF people want to solve. After all, 10,000 years of agricultural selection have radically improved plant productivity, but have left it highly exposed to drought. However, it is not that they have solved the problem. What they have achieved is, in reality, finding the grammar with which to rewrite the problem. The good news: The EU has just changed the rules. For years, European regulation has been very conservative when it comes to gene editing and, although it is true that The Regulation of New Genomic Techniques does not resolve the problem, yes it is a big step forward. Although, of course, that doesn’t mean much: almost 20 years of work has failed miserably. Perhaps the only difference (besides what we are discovering) is that we are running out of time. Time? From the change in rainfall regime in the 80sSpain has experienced increasingly intense drought episodes. In these 40 years, we have experienced at least three very intense episodes. And the structural agrarian impact of all this is enormous: 13 million hectares are rainfed and we do not have water to reconvert them. In the end, sooner rather than later, we are going to need those plants. Image | Wolfgang Hasselmann In Xataka | Spain faces its greatest agricultural challenge of the century: converting 1,901,529 hectares of olive groves into irrigation before it is too late

The most dangerous time of the drought is now. Just when we have the reservoirs full

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Spain has just officially emerged from the drought that it has been dragging on since 2021. And no wonder: the reservoirs are at 83.5%; That is, the highest level recorded in the month of March in the entire historical series. That also explains why we are not talking about it: restrictions have been lifted, administrations have been relaxed and, beyond some very specific places, no one talks about the drought anymore. It is right at this moment that the next water crisis is being prepared. The paradox of abundance. At least, that’s what explains Jorge Rodríguez-Chueca in The Conversation. This professor from the Polytechnic University of Madrid is convinced that now is the time to think about what would happen if it doesn’t rain more all year. Because it is precisely when water begins to run out that the system is most in danger. After all, just one dry year (without changes in consumption) would be enough for the drought to return. The wettest January on record may be, for all we know right now, a mirage. What really is a drought? And it is that, according to the researcherdrought does not begin when there is a lack of water; It begins when consumption is unable to adjust to the variability of inputs. That is why we must stop reactive management and start thinking ahead. But let’s not rush: there are still scars from the drought. And, no matter how happy we are about the current situation, it would be reckless to forget that the effects of the previous drought are still with us. According to many researchers, the It started in 2021 and was the worst drought in 200 years. and, in early 2024, reservoirs reached historic lows. It is true that the situation began to recover shortly after, but it has taken more than two years (and a historic event) for the drought to end. A historical pattern. The most interesting thing about Rodríguez-Chueca’s work is the idea that, in periods of abundance, demand increases (not only is more water consumed, but more is irrigated, more permits are granted, and more facilities and parks are created). When drought hits, consumption is higher and that accelerates the crisis — and the margin for action is smaller. We have seen it many times. As explained in Datadista“since the deep drought of the 1990s, each dry period has served to implement emergency measures (…) or allow practices that were not eliminated when the rains returned, they were used to expand irrigation, increasing the problem of overexploitation and contamination of aquifers and the wetlands they feed.” Will we fall into the same mistake again? That is the big question and there are no signs to be optimistic. Above all, because the problem goes beyond what Rodríguez-Chueca points out: we are talking about a structural problem. Irrigation modernization is a poisoned gift: it reduces water needs per hectare, yes; But that has pushed many dryland farms to be converted into irrigation. Ultimately, each innovation and improvement creates a more efficient system, but more dependent on missing water. This is what has led us to this situation. Image | Anthony Da Costa In Xataka | In the middle of one of the most extreme droughts in living memory, Catalonia has had an idea: start cutting down trees

Predicting a drought six months in advance was a utopia. The UPV has achieved this with a system that uses AI

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In recent years drought episodes have intensified in some regions and fear of a global drought flies over the environment. In this scenario, a team of researchers from the Polytechnic University of Valencia have created a system that can predict whether there will be a drought six months in advance. The system. The work has been carried out by the team from the Institute of Water and Environmental Engineering (IIAMA) of the UPV and has been published in the journal Earth Systems and Environment. The method integrates predictions from four reference climate systems (ECMWF-SEAS5, Météo-France System8, DWD-GCF2.1 and CMCC-SPSv3.5) and are processed using artificial intelligence techniques. From this data, the team calculated two of the most important international drought indices (the Standardized Precipitation Index and the Standardized Precipitation-Evapotranspiration Index), using data windows of 6, 12, 18 and 24 months. The method has been applied in the Júcar River basin, which usually goes through stages of recurrent and quite intense droughts. Why is it important. The novelty of this system is that it is not limited to using a single climate model or index, but rather it merges three pieces that are usually used separately and adds AI processing to correct biases and adapt the models to a regional scale. This allows the prediction to be more reliable since it does not depend on a single model. Furthermore, all of this has been integrated into an operational web toolintended to be used in water management and not only as an academic exercise. Results. The system is correct with a reliability of 90% when the prediction is made for that same month. If they want to obtain predictions three months in advance, the reliability is 60%, while for longer periods (12, 18 and 24 months) they do not give a percentage, but they affirm that the model is still useful for predicting what will happen up to six months in advance. Héctor Macián, co-author of the study, states that “The results confirm that the system is especially effective in reinforcing early warning of droughts, a fundamental aspect to anticipate management measures, reduce socioeconomic impacts and increase resilience to climate change.” Action window. As we said, the methodology has been developed in the Júcar river basin, which is a semi-arid area with long, dry and very hot summers, although researchers highlight that it is transferable to other drought-prone areas. Being able to foresee these episodes with up to six months of margin opens a window to implement the drought management plans much more in advance and thus be able to mitigate the effects. Image | UPV In Xataka | The remains of an ancient Mayan city leave us lessons for the future: an amazing system against drought

Google is going to build a mega data center in a state where the drought is atrocious. Your cooling plan: use air

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The American state of Texas has been dealing with heat wavesdroughts and a increasing pressure on its aquiferswhich makes it on paper one of the worst places to set up a data center. Well, Wilbarger County in Texas is just the place chosen by Google to set up your next data center. But big tech hides an ace up its sleeve: it is not going to use water for cooling, but air. Context. Briefly, a data center is an industrial facility full of servers where information transmitted over the internet, such as AI responses or your Google photos, is stored and processed. And if your personal computer requires cooling when it has been working with a certain intensity for some time to dissipate heat, more of the same with servers, which operate 24/7. The usual thing in these plants is to use thermal dissipation systems with water, either with chillers, evaporation or direct cooling with immersion, thermally efficient solutions, but problematic if water is scarce. The problem? That Texas is an oven that is not for buns: its drought is pressing. But Texas is not a foreign place for Google: it has been in that state for more than 15 years, where it has operational centers in Midlothian and Red Oak and already plans to build two more campuses in Armstrong and Haskell Counties. It’s very serious. The project. The Wilbarger County data center will reduce water use so much that it will restrict its application to basic campus uses such as kitchens and services. As? Google has not provided details of the technology, only that it will be advanced air cooling. Cooling with air in such a hot scenario implies greater energy consumption, so the problem now becomes electricity. What Google proposes is a “Power first” model. In short: the data center goes hand in hand with its own renewable electricity generation plant. Google’s energy partner for this project is AESone of the largest producers of renewables in the US, with whom it has a 20-year energy purchase agreement at an agreed price. This is how both win: AES has stability to build the plants and Google has the guaranteed supply and price. Furthermore, according to Google, they already have the land and the interconnection signed, which saves bureaucracy and launches the project into the construction phase. Why is it important. Because according to EESI estimatesa medium-sized data center can consume 416 million liters per year for thermal dissipation alone, the equivalent of a thousand homes. And if there is a shortage of water, allocating it to meet the needs of a data center is hardly justifiable. Wilbarger’s project solves this with air cooling, removing the precious commodity of water from the equation, but also from the electrical grid itself: Google cooks it and Google eats it (with the help of AES). Given that the demand for computing continues to grow, a model that does not consume water or overload the network emerges as a solution to a resource management problem. In figures. For Google, Wilbarger County is not a pilot plant and its size demonstrates this: 0 liters of water for cooling. The project will provide 7,800 MW of power to the Texas grid. The agreement between the technology and energy companies is for 20 years. Google advertisement an investment item of 40 billion dollars for Texas in November 2025 and has provided a $30 million fund to boost energy initiatives in Texas from 2026 to 2028. It won’t be easy. Although Google has been cryptic when it comes to reporting what the technology, its capacity and needs will be, the reality is that when cooling with air in a hot climate, the pressure is transferred to the electrical grid. On the other hand, and although this specific project points the direction of a possible solution to this problem, we will have to see if and how it can be scaled, because there are more and more data centers and the climate is increasingly more extreme. In Xataka | Google doesn’t have rockets, but it is going to install data centers in space. SpaceX and Blue Origin rub their hands In Xataka | Data centers in space are the finger, Google’s purchase of an electrical company is the Moon Cover | Google Data Centers and Ganapathy Kumar

The economy’s big fear was a simultaneous global drought. Science has found our lifesaver

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We have been observing for years how climatic extremes They hit different parts of the globe, with the experience in Spain still very marked. But with him increase in temperatures To the extreme, one of the biggest fears of climatologists and economists is the synchrony of global droughts. That is, a scenario in which the main food-producing regions dry out at the same time. The good news is that science indicates that the Earth (at the moment) is not drying out. A problem. Logically, if the main countries in the world where wheat, rice, corn or soybeans are produced had a drought simultaneously, we would have a huge problem of product supplywhich for many is a real nightmare. But here the researchers have reached a conclusion: synchronized global droughts are severely limited and barely affect between 1.8% and 6.5% of the global land surface at the same time. Without a doubt, a great respite for economists who saw the end of the world as we know it and who has been published in Nature. But the most impressive thing is that all this is thanks to the oceans. What we knew. Until now, we knew that major climate events such as The Child wave North Atlantic Oscillationcould alter rainfall patterns thousands of miles away through what scientists call “teleconnections.” And it is something that the research team itself pointed out in the past: there are interconnected drought nodes at different latitudes, most in North America, South America, Africa and Australia. That is, when there is drought in one place, it can move to another. But, if these nodes are connected… Why doesn’t the entire planet dry out at once when there is an anomaly like El Niño? The answer is in the oceanic variability. An ally. In this case, the oceans act as an immense regulatory mechanism and that is why the authors literally speak of a phenomenon called ‘geographic trapping’. In this way, the dynamics of the oceans force the scale of these hydrological extremes to remain confined to certain areas, preventing drought from spreading across all continents simultaneously between the different nodes. It matters more that it doesn’t rain. Another of the findings that may be surprising derives from a common myth about extreme droughts. In this case we usually automatically associate the worst droughts with the suffocating heat wavesbut, nevertheless, the data from the last 120 years are clear in pointing out that the lack of precipitation dominates over high temperatures when determining the severity of a drought. That is to say, it is important that it does not rain or that it is extremely hot. Specifically, the lack of rain is responsible for two-thirds of the impact of the severity of these events, relegating temperature to a secondary role, although not negligible in a world that is moving towards warming of up to three degrees Celsius. It’s good news. That the planet has mechanisms to avoid a total global drought is excellent news for global food security and international markets, by ensuring supply for supermarkets. But scientists point out that we should not let our guard down. It must be kept in mind that, although 6.5% of land affected simultaneously, the maximum possibility that we have mentioned before, seems small on a planetary scale, if that percentage coincides exactly with the great “breadbaskets of the world”, the economic and humanitarian disaster can be equally devastating. In this way, the regions identified as “hubs” host a large part of global agricultural production, and the study warns of a growing systemic vulnerability in these areas. Images | edcharlie In Xataka | The drought is turning water into a very scarce and valuable commodity in Spain. And there are already organized groups of thieves

wells, drought and the hidden side of the avocado

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Avocado is undoubtedly a very delicious food and also in high demand for its good macros, which has led to an increase in its production. This proliferation in its cultivation seems to bring good news for our land (especially because it sells well), but on the Costa del Sol and the Tropical Coast of Malaga and Granada the great environmental impacts are already seen which is generating such as the plowing of the slopes and a large water consumption that aggravates the drought already typical of southern Spain. A great consumption. To put figures, More than 20,000 hectares are now dedicated to avocados in these provinceswith some 5,000 hectares converted from dry land to irrigated land, with dubious legality behind it, which has also caused the appearance up to 250 illegal wells in 2023. This expansion, which represents 30% of the Andalusian avocado area (about 9,400 hectares in total), has replaced traditional crops with hypertensive tropical crops despite the climate crisis. All to opt for a crop that can undoubtedly give a great economic return. Environmentalism. A recent complaint made through Along with this complaint, which points to the serious environmental problems that are being experienced, different images are shown that undoubtedly speak for themselves to understand how this crop is affecting the geography. Publication in X by Santiago M. Barajas | Via X What we are seeing is not just agriculture; It is an industrial transformation of the landscape that is pushing the water and geological resources of Malaga and Granada to the limit. This is how avocado and mango have gone from being “green gold” to becoming an environmental time bomb. Destruction engineering. Traditionally, agriculture in these areas was adapted to the natural orography of the land. But now, the model that has been imposed, driven by the very high profitability of the tropical fruit, does the opposite: adapt the orography to the crop by force. According to Ecologists in Action and confirm various edaphic studiesthe implementation of these crops requires heavy machinery to break slopes. The process eliminates the original vegetation cover to create artificial terraces. The result? A severe degradation of the soil in its surface horizons. A problem with storms. With this degradation, what is caused is the elimination of natural vegetation, which produces a “sealing” of the soil and consequently the appearance of cracks that nullify its biological functions. The problem arises when torrential rains appear (increasingly more frequent in the Mediterranean), which causes the water to not filter and run away, dragging nutrients and causing massive erosion. This is something that translates into the use of more fertilizers by farmers, which end up contaminating the subsoil. In short, we are facing a vicious cycle of chemical and physical degradation. An infinite thirst. The avocado is a fruit that fits perfectly in the rainforest, but has now been transplanted in an area with a semi-arid Mediterranean climate. An ideal place for traditional dryland crops such as olive or almond trees that can survive on what falls from the sky. But avocado or mango in a hypertensive model demand about 7,500 cubic meters of water per hectare per year. These demands Added to the large number of plantations that exist, as we have commented previously, it leads to great water tension that we have seen reflected in the La Viñuela reservoir, which has reached only 7% of its capacity in 2023, and which has reached La Axarquía in Malaga. to a critical situation. And this deficit is not solved with rain, but with drilling machines that open wells in the area. In this way, the direct consequence is clear: overexploitation of aquifers and their salinization due to marine intrusion. An escalated problem. This avocado bubble does not stop increasing in our country. Given the collapse that has been experienced in Malagathe model has been replicated in Cádiz, Hueva or Murcia, which in the end are regions that already suffer their own water stress due to not receiving much rainfall throughout the year. But not only has he been emigrating from the provinces, but he has also escalated to the judicial field, where the prosecution points it is already being investigated a possible environmental crime with damage to the public water domain valued at 10 million euros and the illegal theft of up to 26 cubic hectometers of water. And in many of these regions citizens have had to suffer supply cuts due to this shortage, while this agricultural model continued to demand A solution. What is proposed In this case it is the ordered de-escalation of these crops. To achieve this, the goal is to stop new irrigation talks and close illegal wells. The problem is that it faces a very important leg of the economy of some of these provinces, against the change in the landscapes of the region. In Xataka | Andalusia has become a hostile land for the avocado. So an unexpected region is taking over: Galicia

Spain has more and more problems with the drought and criminal networks have begun to realize it

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This story begins with a civil guard couple in civilian clothes chasing a tanker truck. They have been following trucks for months, they have checked thousands of livestock farms and, finally, they are about to find something. With 50 million liters of something. The initial track. More than a hundred residents of a district of Lorca denounced last year that there was an entire network selling water tanks to supply agricultural operations. It is nothing new: the Civil Guard has numerous investigations underway into the inspection and control of water use. Therefore, SEPRONA started to investigate the matter. And what have they found? The surveillance device located the tanker truck filling point: it was a well without authorizations for use and without a volumetric counter or any other type of measuring instrument. It seemed difficult to know the number of liters extracted. However, as the company pretended to be legitimate, the Civil Guard has been able to document that, during the last 18 months, 56 million liters of water had been sold for a value of at least 275,000 euros. This is only in the last 18 months: the armed institute believes that the illegal use of the well may have lasted several decades. Just one case out of a million. Over the last few years We have been talking about dozens of people investigated, detained and convicted due to illegal irrigation: in 2023 alone, hundreds of millions of cubic meters of water have been extracted illegally. The problem is real: so real that the Malaga water company has even hired private detectives to monitor employees, suppliers and customers. However, the key to this is not what has already happened. The key is what is going to happen. The list of threats is enormous. Climate change, overexploitation of aquifers, intensive agriculture, inadequate water management, forest fires, deforestation and population growth… Spain has a problem with water and that problem is not going to stop growing and growing. In this context, robberies are going to become more frequent and common. And that’s saying a lot: according to WWFthere are more than 500,000 illegal wells. But no one can be surprised. After all, there is a high financial incentive and relatively low penalties. Most cases they end, in fact, in fines and that is an excellent breeding ground for a huge problem. Image | VD Photography | Elentir In Xataka | Spain is facing a brutal drought and there are farmers watering avocados irregularly. A prosecutor wants it to be a crime

Spanish wine promised them very happy after the end of drought. The price of grapes is changing everything

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The wine industry is facing a complicated year. In the eye of the hurricane, the price of grapes, such a low price that is leading farmers to stand up war. A problem that It has been hanging on the sector From before even the beginning of the harvest. The food chain law. The Unió Llauradora, Agrarian Organization of Valencian, has been the last sector group in denounce the situation of the grape market. The organization has claimed to claim Ministry of Agriculture Valenciana A study on the production costs for the grapes used for wine production, a study they consider could “endorse possible complaints for breach of the food chain law.” This legislation is responsible for regulating “the operation and vertebration of the food chain.” A law that seeks, According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Foodimprove the efficacy and competitiveness of the sector while reducing the imbalance in commercial relations. According to explained in a statement The Llauradora Unió, this legislation “the only instrument that producers possess to defend their interests (…) in the face of commercial distribution abuses.” 20% less. Farmers do not consider that the price at which wine producers buy the grape is fair. According to the forecasts of the Valencian Sector Association, the price of grapes could fall by more than 20% this year. Expectations v. reality. The Valencian field is the last to join the complaints of other vinification grape -producing regions. The harvest seemed to be abundant, with some areas relying on a recovery in production also 20%. This increase in supply would be the great engine of the price drop, a decrease such that for some wine producing regions they have indicated in recent months that they would not allow them to cover production costs. To this problem, the Unió Llauradora adds another in the fact that its harvest is not even reaching the expected volume at first. Despite this, prices, based on more optimistic expectations, They continue to be low. “The rains recorded at certain times of the campaign were a relief and contributed to the recovery of the vine The association stands out. One crisis after another. The current one is just one of the crises that the sector has had to face in recent years. The increase that some wine regions have seen in production responds rather to a recovery compared to recent years, marked by the drought that put a good part of the agricultural sector against the strings (even the farmer). In Xataka | During centuries Galicia was a thriving land of olive groves with unique varieties in the world. What changed it is still a mystery Image | Dailos Medina / Pixabay

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