The agony It was announced for days, but this has not taken away gravity to the historic day that has been lived this Tuesday in the Canal d’Urgell (Lleida). “We shut down the main channel and it’s a sad day for the farmers“, he laments Xavi Diazgeneral director of the General Community of Irrigators of the Canal d’Urgellwhich supplies water to more than 50,000 hectares of fields. An unprecedented closure in the 160-year history of the infrastructure.
In the coming weeks, priority will be given to urban supply and many farmers will lose part of the harvest. Those affected estimate the losses caused by the drought in thousands of euros and are waiting for help from the Administration.
The water will be for urban supply and an emergency irrigation will be maintained to save the fruit trees
Only one will be supplied small amount of water for the ones fruit trees survive. “It will be a risk of rescuenot to produce but so that they don’t die”, details Diaz.
Pep Vidal He is one of those who will experience this exceptional measure up close. He grows apple trees in Vilanova de Bellpuig (Urgell) and Arbeca (les Garrigues). “The younger apple treeswhich have shorter roots, if it does not rain in May, they will die“he warns.
TO Vidal, an apple tree can cost you more than four euros. But the investment goes much further: “For three years, it does not produce anything for you and you have to spend on pass, chemicals, irrigation. It is a medium-term investment that can blow up in a few weeks.”
dried apples
the harvest is loss. Now the only goal is save so many trees as possible: “If they die it will be a drama, but also a lot of extra work from replant and uproot dead trees”. These days, he and his companions dedicate themselves to apply a chemical so that the apples fall to the ground.
“They are not big enough and we will leave them on the ground rotting or drying upbut we have to make them fall so that the tree does not consume so much water“, details.
“Younger apple trees, with shorter roots, if it doesn’t rain in May, they will die”
Pep Vidal, farmer
Vidal demands urgent aid: “Not even to avoid losing money, I don’t ask or win anymore”. The Government has told them that they will arrive but has not specified how or how much. Added to the demand manel pedrolfarmer of Preixana (Urgell). It has fields of dry land and others irrigated: “Dry cereals (wheat and barley) are already lost. those of irrigation they will be in Little time if it doesn’t start to rain.”
In fact, in the irrigated area also had to plant wheat and barley, winter crops, which consume less than corn and fodder, which was originally planned for harvest in summer.
“If it doesn’t rain, we will lose half the harvest. This is the most expensive campaign we have experienced, due to the high costs of fertilizers, adobes and seeds“, he complains. The only objective of Pedrol is to cover expenses. And without aid from the Administration, he sees it as complicated.
mouth water
From now on, the water of the Canal d’Urgell will have a unique priority objective: get to the houses. “The Rialb reservoir is at a minimum, so the channel, as of today, has a continuous flow of two cubic meters per second, when it was 23 m3 per second”, specifies Diaz.
“May will decide everything. If it rains, we could redirect the use of water”
Xavi Díaz, director of Canal d’Urgell
Throughout the infrastructure there are a series of water retentions that generate small artificial reservoirs. These warehouses will continue to be filled with the low flow of the canal and the municipalities will use them to meet urban needs. In addition, a call for savings has been made.
“We make a balancing game to guarantee the different uses of water”, affirms Díaz. He believes that right now, this is the only way out. “Everything will depend on whatever happens in may, if it rains we could change the planning a bit. At the moment it is in risk summer, but also autumn and winter“.
He The Government has asked the Ministry of Agriculture actions so that the irrigators of the Canal d’Urgell receive a “must have” investment that would allow them to make a more “sustainable” use of water, given the current climate emergency. Jorda proposes to the ministry that co-finance this modernization in a percentage of 40%since it is the oldest irrigation network in Spain without modernizing.
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In the last hours, the ‘councillor’ Teresa Jorda has insisted on criticizing the “little planning” of the Ebro Hydrographic Confederation (CHE), which takes the decisions about what is done in the Canal d’Urgell and that it did not apply any restrictions so far.
However the director of the irrigators disagrees: “The CHE is not an interventionist and this always works. Nobody could know that we would have the lowest contributions of the last 70 years”. The most pessimistic forecasts are imposed now and the farmers wait without irrigating and waiting for help and of rain. These two elements are the only thing that can save a ominous season.