La construcció històrica dels paisatges de regadiu a les Illes Balears. Auge, decadència i implicacions ambientals

Abstract

The changes in economic and territorial matters that occurred in the Balearic Islands with the arrival of mass tourism in the 1960s have caused a loss of agricultural area in favor of an increase in forest masses and urbanized land. However, contrary to what one might think, this new economic model linked to tourism did not translate into an abandonment of agricultural activity as a whole. Irrigated agriculture experienced a phase of great expansion as a model of urban economy was established that was responsible for putting an end to the social and economic structures of strong agrarian tradition, maintained for centuries. The irrigated landscapes configured in the second half of the twentieth century acquired a morphology quite far from that of the rainfed agricultural landscapes that could not avoid being damaged by the loss of agriculture caused by competition with other uses and the loss of agricultural income associated with the increase in production costs. In no case, irrigation was a new agricultural use system on the islands, but its origin dates back to very ancient times, being numerous samples of hydraulic heritage that show the medieval origin of this use in the Balearic islands. The investigation in multiple sources on irrigation on the islands has allowed to elaborate a work that stands out for offering a historical tour through its landscapes and that culminate in the elaboration of a cartography that invites to analyze the changes in terms of spatial distribution of irrigated landscapes. The structure of land ownership, advances in hydraulic systems and population growth have combined in the right way to grow irrigated areas at a time when the total agricultural area was shrinking. However, since the 1990s, the irrigated area has been shrinking due to the opening of the market for agricultural products to other countries and the requirements of the European agricultural policy to reduce production in certain sectors which, in the case of the islands, maintained a close link with irrigation. With the expressions boom and bust, the approach to the evolution of the irrigated spaces on the islands is completed, an evolution segmented in different stages that can be the object of scientific study through the observation of the transformations on the landscape that are coupled with the multiple hydraulic systems.