The National Federation of Irrigation Communities of Spain (Fenacore) has demanded that the parties contesting the general elections on November 29 promote a Water State Pact, accelerate the construction of the hydraulic infrastructures even without them having been executed yet, and maintain the modernization process of irrigation, among other actions.
According to the federation, political formations should promote a major national agreement on water matters that would make it possible to design water policy "with technical, scientific and economic criteria, apart from political confrontation and electoral cycles". With this, stable and lasting commitments would be established that reduce uncertainty for irrigation communities and make it easier to plan the necessary investments to ensure supply.
Again, the organization has insisted on the need to materialize the infrastructures included in the currently in-force hydrological plans. In its view, each action must have a public schedule, a specific budget allocation, and clear deadlines. In particular, it has highlighted the importance of reservoirs "for their role in regulating water resources and guaranteeing the availability of water".
To ensure that these works are carried out, Fenacore proposes strengthening control mechanisms through annual reports that detail the items earmarked, the investments actually carried out, and the actions still pending. It also proposes introducing corrective measures that would make it possible to correct delays and turn planning on paper into effective projects.
The federation also calls for a greater level of involvement by the General State Administration in the conservation, maintenance and safety of hydraulic infrastructures owned by the state, noting that "many" have "an important degree of aging".
In this line, it suggests reserving at least 100 million euros a year for these tasks and analyzing the option of resorting to European financing through FEDER funds. Likewise, it proposes that these investments could be amortized over a 25-year horizon, instead of being charged in a single fiscal year, in order to make them financially viable and facilitate long-term programming.
Fenacore has also requested "a firm commitment" to the modernization of irrigation in Spain. To this end, it urges negotiating with the European Union (EU) for the extension or renewal of the funds intended for this objective, to maintain the digitalization programs linked to the PERTE, and to extend to all autonomous communities (CCAA) the model of collaboration between these, SEIASA and the irrigators themselves to co-finance the actions.
Ecological flows and drought management
In another block of proposals, the irrigators call for a "homogeneous and transparent" methodology to set ecological flows in the different river basin districts, enabling their impact on the water available for irrigation to be measured and quantified. "These decisions must be based on technical criteria and consider the characteristics of each basin, as well as their effects on water uses," they insist.
Likewise, they ask for strengthening water regulation capacity and improving the prevention and response tools for extreme episodes, through the preparation of drought management protocols, the rollout of alert systems, making use of periods of abundant water, and closer cooperation between basins and administrations to optimize existing resources.
Among their demands for 29N is also the implementation of a plan that would make it possible to achieve by 2027 the European objectives for the good status of groundwater, supported by technical criteria and adapted to the specific situation of each aquifer.
Similarly, Fenacore urges defending before Community institutions an application of environmental and agricultural regulations that considers Spain’s hydrological particularities, the effective availability of resources, and the economic viability of the operations. In this area, it calls for introducing mirror clauses in commercial agreements, reducing the bureaucratic burden, and ensuring agricultural profitability as "essential elements" to protect food security.
For the federation, the set of these proposals constitutes “a baseline document” to continue shaping the future of irrigation with the next Government. It understands that this future involves taking water out of partisan confrontation and designing policies with less ideology and more balance. It also asserts that irrigators should hold in society the place, in its view, that corresponds to a key sector to guarantee food production, stop the abandonment of rural areas, and help mitigate the most serious impacts of climate change.