Thousands of people gathered this Sunday to form a three-kilometer human chain in defense of Mallorca’s natural areas, under the slogan ‘Neither before, nor now, nor ever: Hands off Es Trenc‘. Organizers estimate that 10,000 people attended in a festive, family-friendly, and protest atmosphere. Organizations such as GOB, Menys Turisme, Més Vida, and Terraferida had called on citizens to gather early in the morning at the Arenal de Sa Ràpita.
These organizations called for a protest, alleging that the park’s management by decree of the Governing Council – a process initiated by the law on the acceleration of strategic projects – represents a step toward reducing its level of protection. According to these organizations, this mechanism is designed to be applied in the future to other protected natural areas.
The organizers, who estimated the turnout at 10,000 people, described the event as a success and said they were pleasantly surprised by the great public response it had received. “The public response confirms that protecting the island is a shared concern for thousands of people and sends a very clear message to the authorities: Mallorcan society will not accept any rollback in the protection of natural areas,” they stated.
Specific measures
Writer Sebastià Alzamora was in charge of reading the manifesto, which calls for the withdrawal of the law for the acceleration of strategic projects, the suspension and withdrawal of the deregulation provisions of the agricultural law, a total ban on the rental of rural properties, and the elimination of the minimum 14,000-square-meter requirement of the Mallorca territorial plan. “We are not asking for utopian ideals or extravagant demands, but for concrete, realistic, and, above all, urgent measures for the common good. The model the regional government wants to promote is a destructive model that has not been wanted, and is not wanted, anywhere else,” he stated.
After the President of the Regional Government, Marga Prohens, dismissed warnings about the alleged lack of protection as “false alarms” and the Minister of Agriculture, Joan Simonet, recorded a video in the area guaranteeing protection, the manifesto has reiterated that “although the PP accuses environmental organizations of spreading lies and false information, and no matter how many videos Minister Simonet makes while walking on water promising that not a single square meter of Es Trenc will lose its protection, the reality is that this new legal framework is tailor-made to fill Es Trenc with buildings, beach bars, parking lots, beach facilities, and all kinds of tourist developments.”
The text also warns that, with “a little tolerance and goodwill,” the apartments, hotels, and other services will continue. “A S’Arenal in Campos and a Magaluf in the south of the island. That’s what they want,” they added.
Other natural areas
The manifesto warns that the amendments to the omnibus bill, in addition to Es Trenc, leave other key areas of the local ecosystem—such as Cabrera, Sa Dragonera, and the Serra de Tramuntana—unprotected. The agricultural law, they have warned, turns the “foravila” into a building plot where anyone can build wherever and however they want.
“This is a real offensive to cover everything with cement, concrete, asphalt, and glass and, above all, to fill the pockets of a few privileged people – most of them foreigners and a handful from here.” It should be remembered that protected natural areas are safeguarded by several layers of legislation. The most important of these, according to the organizing bodies, is the Natural Resources Management Plan (PORN), a tool that can establish restrictions that take precedence over any other spatial planning instrument.
In some cases, especially in the case of Es Trenc, these restrictions are particularly strict and prevent, for example, any increase in tourist accommodation capacity. “We believe that the PP’s ultimate goal is precisely to weaken these protective measures. The PORNs currently constitute the main barrier against new urban, tourist, or economic pressures on protected natural areas,” they explained.
In the case of Es Trenc, the path opened by the law for accelerating strategic projects will facilitate the removal of certain prohibitions currently in effect, such as those affecting large-scale energy generation infrastructure, the installation of new overhead power lines, fishing and shellfish harvesting in brackish lagoons, intensive hunting, hunting outside of the reserves designated under the current technical plan, the extraction of groundwater for industrial use, sand extraction, parking lots, and any activity that involves a significant alteration of the habitats and species within the park.
