Feature: Spain's Ebro Transfer - a major turnaround

A golden opportunity

(Author: Saren Starbridge)

In March of 2004, Spain elected a new government. In April, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Prime Minister of the newly-elected government, announced that 'the Ebro transfer will be repealed and that a review of the SNHP may stop some specific infrastructures, replacing them with more efficient, cheaper and less disputed projects.'

SNHP is the controversial Spanish National Hydrological Plan, approved by the previous government in 2001. The Ebro transfer, a plan to build a network of dams and pipes that would carry 1,050 cubic hectometres of water per year out of the Ebro river basin into four other basins, is the largest transfer project ever proposed in Europe.

Zapatero's announcement has given campaigners some breathing space, but more importantly, it offers an opportunity to change the direction of water management in Europe. Guido Schmidt, WWF-Spain's Freshwater Officer has hailed the decision as 'a big step for water conservation', noting that it 'sets an example for the rest of the world.'

'It offers us a golden opportunity to make use of the beauty of this natural area to promote some kind of sustainable eco-tourism,' hopes Cutts.