A fruit farmer in the Axarquía has just cut down his plantation of avocado trees, all 600 of them, because there isn’t enough water available to maintain them alive.

It took, this 66-year-old man over 30 years to get his fruit farm to that stage, but now with the sequía (drought) it has all come to an end. Simply, he preferred to cut them all down than to watch them slowly die from a lack of water.

He explained that he will now leave his land in the Valle del Río Benamargosa barbecho (fallow) and wait to see if the wet cycle returns. If it does, he won’t be planting mangoes like many others, as they are very thirsty trees.

He explained that with the rationed water quota that he receives, 1,500 cubic metres per hectare, it is impossible to maintain the plantation of avocados as the trees need a minimum of 6,000 cubic metres of water.

He thinks the various administrations aren’t doing enough and that his fellow farmers are too comfortable at home to go out and protest. He considers that there are viable options, such as a desalination plant or treated water from the sewage plants. “Politicians only look after the interests of tourism,” he thinks.

But whatever happens, after clearing two hectares of avocado trees, he will no longer harvest between ten and twelve tonnes of fruit each season. And he is not alone as there are around 700 fruit farmers in the area with a total of 826 hectares of fruit trees, mainly avocados and mangoes.

Editorial comment: there is a complete lack of control in Andalucía over clearing land for irrigation. Farmers plant trees without taking into consideration to lower rainfalls register each year – nobody stops them. Nobody has sat down and worked out how much irrigated land each valley can support. It’s a mess.

(News: Velez-Málaga, Axarquia, Costa del Sol, Málaga, Andalucia – Photo/original report: E Cabezas)