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Date Published: 17/01/2024

A new leaf for protection of the Mar Menor: Special Commission created to safeguard ecosystem

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Left and right have joined hands to advance environmental protection for the Mar Menor by creating an ‘Interadministrative Commission’

A new leaf for protection of the Mar Menor: Special Commission created to safeguard ecosystem

After many years, false starts, disagreements and prevarications, new ground has finally been broken on the protection of the Mar Menor lagoon, so to speak.

Today, Wednesday January 17, the conservative President of the Region of Murcia, Fernando López Miras, and the liberal Minister for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (Miteco), Teresa Ribera, signed into existence the creation of an Interadministrative Commission for the Mar Menor ecosystem.

The pair even took a walk together through the area’s wetlands, serving to cement a modicum of peace between both administrations following years of political confrontation over solutions to recover the fragile environment.

The new Interadministrative Commission of the Mar Menor, made up of representatives of the General Administration of the State, the Autonomous Community and several of the Region’s town councils, aims to promote coordination and cooperation when it comes to public policies and actions that affect the lagoon.

It was also signed by the mayors of the ten town councils of the salt lagoon’s basin, namely San Pedro del Pinatar, San Javier, Los Alcázares, Cartagena, Fuente Álamo, Torre Pacheco, La Unión, Murcia, Alhama de Murcia and Mazarrón.

The minister herself explained that today was a “symbolic, but enormously important act”, since it represents the “will to work together to solve problems”, in this case the tragic degradation of “one of the most precious ecosystems in the Mediterranean”.

Environmental action group Pacto por el Mar Menor said of the deal, “We have been waiting a long time for this collaboration between administrations and we have high hopes that it will work well. We hope that this day will mark a new direction for the future of the Mar Menor.”

This commission, Miteco indicates, is a demand that the Government of Spain has been making since the approval, in 2020, of the Law for the Recovery and Protection of the Mar Menor.

According to López Miras, it was the Covid-19 pandemic and last year’s local and national elections that delayed the creation of this new body.

The Ministry has further stated that the deal it reached for the protection of the Doñana Natural Park with the Junta de Andalucía and the Huelva town councils has served as a precedent for this Mar Menor deal.

Fernando López Miras, for his part, said, “The constitution of this commission will allow us to obtain results that are only obtained when we all row in the same direction.”

Although he has acknowledged that “there is still a lot to do”, he has expressed confidence that, “coordinated, we will do it faster”.

How the Commission will work

The Interadministrative Commission of the Mar Menor, included in article 5 of the Recovery and Protection Law, is made up of representatives of the three administrations.

The duration of the protocol signed this Wednesday will be four years from the date of its subscription, which may be extended by express wish of the parties. This body will meet at least once a year, in person or by videoconference, or when requested by three of the participating town councils, the General Administration of the State or the Autonomous Community.

Beyond the creation of this new entity, the visit of the Minister has not brought any new investments or new specific measures for the protection to the Mar Menor. Rather, the Ministry’s roadmap for the recovery of the ecosystem and its basin is the Framework of Priority Actions, which was presented in November 2021 and the budget for which is 484 million euros, to be doled out in increments until 2026.

Of the 484 million, the Ministry has already spent 57 million (11.74%), has committed to the expenditure of another 110.4 million (22.8%) and has begun the processing of projects worth 464.1 million euros (95.8%), as reported by sources from the Ministerial team.

Read also: Another 2.6 million invested in the Mar Menor for 2024

What is being done to protect the Mar Menor right now?

Regarding the actions carried out by the Region of Murcia government in the protection of the Mar Menor, López Miras highlighted tasks such as the removal of biomass and the monitoring of scientific data. These investments also include more than 7 million euros to build the Mar Menor Observatory in the old facilities of the San Javier airport.

Furthermore, the Community continues to invest in developing the wetland network, in setting up purification stations and in preventing runoff water into the lagoon by holding it in tanks and ponds. One such example is the Torre Pacheco storm tank, which was inaugurated last year and which is capable of processing 66,000 cubic metres of water. Soon, another tank in Playa Honda will serve the same purpose in the municipality of Cartagena.

The current state of the Mar Menor

The Ministry estimates that 3,580 tons of nitrates and 19.7 tons of phosphates are dumped into the Mar Menor each year as a result of agricultural and livestock activity, as well as due to old mining activity, urban planning and tourism. For this reason, renaturalising the plots of land around the lagoon and acting on the mining mountain range are key to addressing the problem of pollution in the Mar Menor.

They also consider it necessary to acquire land to create a Green Belt that stops, treats and eliminates the pollution that currently reaches the lagoon. This belt will cover 1,000 hectares of surface area.

Minister Ribera explained that the Biodiversity Foundation, in collaboration with the Technical Office for the Mar Menor, resolved on December 30 the call for aid with an investment of 16.2 million euros for eleven projects. This aid aims to recover the biological integrity of the Mar Menor through restoration and environmental improvement in the agricultural field.

The agroecological transition, she added, represents a shift in agricultural activity in order to reduce its impact on the Mar Menor watershed. “This process requires the involvement of all actors in society, where agricultural associations are a fundamental part of the solution,” she concluded.

Images: CARM