Economic cycles and environmental crisis in arid southeastern Spain. A historical perspective

Abstract

The arid southeast region has been one of the areas with the oldest settlement in the Iberian Peninsula. Despite limitations imposed by lack of water and low soil fertility, a great number of dwellers have settled in this land for three thousand years thanks to its easy access to the commercial paths of the Mediterranean. The area is currently under great territorial and socioeconomic transformation activated by intensive agriculture through greenhouses and irrigation. The history of this territory offers a series of successful and downward cycles determined, from an ecological and economic point of view, by its integration in different stages of the globalization process. Most recently, in the 19th century an intensive deforestation process took place caused by the mining and iron industry. The deep economic and social crisis which followed the declining of this development model brought also about an ecological crisis. In the second half of the 20th century, negative environmental effects have continued and extended to the next generations with problems such as territorial saturation and aquifer depletion that characterize the new intensive agriculture under plastic. The current debate about the sustainability of this developmental model in such vulnerable environment can take advantage of some ecological lessons from the past.

Factors influencing local ecological knowledge maintenance in Mediterranean watersheds: Insights for environmental policies

“…This observation can be explained by various factors. The first is the intense processes of outmigration that has occurred since the last century in the area, reaching its maximum during the 1950s and 1960s (Sánchez-Picón et al 2011). In fact, the time spent in the area (which was negatively correlated with the outmigration process) was the most important factor explaining the maintenance of LEK (Table 2).…”

Social preferences regarding the delivery of ecosystem services in a semiarid Mediterranean region

“…This attitude toward biodiversity in turn affects landscape management and, therefore, the delivery of ecosystem services (McNeely, 2000). Semiarid ecosystems in the south-eastern Iberian Peninsula are particularly susceptible to overexploitation because of the recent increase in intensive agriculture and tourism activities (García-Latorre and Sánchez-Picón, 2001;Downward and Taylor, 2007;Sanchez-Picón et al, 2011), which has led society to perceive nature conservation as a threat to human development (Tschakert, 2007).…”

River basins as social-ecological systems: linking levels of societal and ecosystem water metabolism in a semiarid watershed

“…Andarax hydrology through centuries of human transformations of the territory (Latorre et al 2001, Sánchez-Picón et al 2011.…”

“…We focus on the period when the international economic and political arena became key drivers for regional change. Contrary to other regions in Spain, Almeria had, from the onset of 19th century, an export-based economy thanks to its important harbor (Sánchez-Picón et al 2011; Table 1). This first globalization brought a flourishing lead mining activity lasting over a century until its international depreciation.…”

“…during the reforestation campaigns of the Franco's dictatorship (Martínez et al 2008). The second globalization begun at the end of 19th century and elicited the decline of this economy and the first emigration boom between 1980-2000(Sánchez-Picón et al 2011. Part of this boom followed an internal drift from upper mountain areas to the coast where the grape cultivation infrastructure was repurposed to introduce intensive vegetable production in plastic greenhouses for distribution in the European market (Mateo 2013).…”