The legislative measures to save the Sea Child will continue to accumulate. The Government of Murcia PP —supported by Citizens— has approved this Thursday in the Council of Government of the decree-law on the Comprehensive Protection of the Mar Menor. The minister of Agriculture, Antonio Luengo, has acknowledged in a press conference this morning that “with this decree alone will not recover Sea Minor” because it only regulates the uses. He has thrown balls out and has reminded the Government of Spain that “if you don’t do the homework it will be very difficult [to regeneration]. Are required as the action plan for zero discharge”.
The decree, which includes a penalty system, and control with fines of up to 500,000 euros, according to Luengo, you must obtain yet the approval of the regional Parliament, something that seems to be guaranteed given that Vox has announced that it will support because they “have included therein all claims and modifications”, in addition to the farmers. According to Luengo, the company “has sent us a clear message, to recover the lagoon, and it is our task. There is No political or partisan interests, in this way, and no one will understand the vetoes a law so necessary as this,” he indicated.
The region’s account currently with the law on Protection of the Sea under Urgent Measures, adopted in February of 2018, in addition to have a comprehensive management plan, among other regulations. Conservationists ANSE, a group very active since years in complaints about the state of the lagoon, assure that “the decree is made quickly to get out of the way, and adds nothing new”.
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The document divides the area affected in two areas (I, nearest the sea, and the II). Inside the action star, it expands to 500 metres, the prohibition of the use of fertilizers, manures or paid in green, which is now in the 100 metres, and the direct application of pig manure (from livestock). Also limited in zone I, the amount of annual crops, depending on the size of the root and of the management and prohibit the transformations of rainfed to irrigated land.
With these measures, the aim is to tackle the great problem of the lagoon, that has its main origin in the landfill for decades of waters with nitrates from agricultural fertilizers. Official data estimate that in the aquifer that discharge in the laguna have accumulated 300,000 tonnes of nitrates. Discharges of urban wastewater have also contributed. As a result, it has lost 85% of the seagrass meadows in the Mar Menor, and is still remembered with horror in the area, the massive death of fish that took place the past month of October.
The decree sets an area of temporary exclusion for new developments until it approves the Plan of Ordination of the territory of the Watershed of the Mar Menor, to which is fixed a term of five years. There are exceptions: you can build if this is the natural extension of urban areas consolidated. This new plan will pick up the adaptation of agricultural uses, the establishment of an ecological corridor around the Mar Menor as a natural filter, improving the urban quality of the built-up areas and to regulate urban density.
In regard to the recreational uses in the lagoon, it prohibits the construction of new marinas, a measure already collected in the comprehensive management plan, and the boats of two-stroke carburetor, the high speed or the reach sound levels to be excessive. Vessels exceeding eight metres in length must be equipped with water tank black and grey, and the that have engine, use biodegradable oils.
“On the Mar Menor converge a plurality of uses that there are that sort, and only if they are harmonized in a sustainable manner will recover,” said the counselor. Luengo, explained that the aim is to “order and control, of a most comprehensive manner, the activity surrounding the Mar Menor and to regain their state.”
The PSOE in Murcia is not willing to support the decree. Monday presented a battery of urgent measures to improve the draft, among which was the which could not use fertilisers on an area of 1,500 meters from the coast line, in front of the 500 who set the project. At the same time, pointed out that spatial planning should affect the entire basin and that will take place in three years, not five.
