A shaft, it would not have allowed to pass

Since the 13th century. In January, sitting in the two-year-old Julen from the southern Spanish Totalán in about 75 meters of depth in a narrow shaft. On Tuesday afternoon the rescue teams suspected to be only a few meters from the boy. With pickaxes and shovels, it should go further – always with the hope to find the child still alive.

The shaft of the small Julen prior to now ten days, like should be, should never have been drilled. This is now: It had no valid license for the hole, writes the daily newspaper El Mundo. The owner of the property and the contractor who dug the hole, to blame each other.

What now triggers outrage, is in Spain, however, common practice. Felipe Fuentelsaz by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has estimated that in Andalusia, about 10'000 of these illegal holes. "The Region has due to its position is a huge Problem with water shortages, but at the same time by a growing tourism sector and the transition to a resource-intensive agriculture, a growing demand," he says.

farmers and entrepreneurs are seeking illegally to water sources

on the one Hand, demand more holiday guests and a growing number of Golf courses, a corresponding supply, on the other hand, the Region earned much-needed money in the global appetite for Avocados, mangoes, olives and strawberries, which are grown in the Region. The water resources in Andalusia due to the high consumption regularly to dangerously low levels.

So Julen is to be recovered: a sketch of the salvage work. Photo: Reuters

cities such as Malaga or Seville months regulations threaten especially during the summer. In the basin of the Guadalquivir river in Seville, about 500 million cubic meters of water missing, according to the WWF. to

the irrigation of fields or growing areas do not reduce, and to preserve the existence of their own, many farmers and businessmen illegally to water sources. So it should be done in Totalán.

the most important wetland in Spain, the Doñana in Huelva on the Atlantic coast is Affected. Systematically, the farmers dig there to the nature reserve the water to save their Crops and income. The local authorities were completely overwhelmed with the fight against the illegal irrigation, complains of the WWF.

Also, the relatively low penalties would not deter the Farmer. "If someone is caught and punished, says he pays a Fine he can afford rather than the water-consuming to do without," Fuentelsaz. Environmentalists have been fighting for this reason that such foods be labeled in the supermarkets that were produced with the use of legal sources of water. (Editorial Tamedia)

Created: 22.01.2019, 21:09 PM