For the fourth consecutive year, the cherry harvest campaign in the Marina Alta valleys (Vall d'Ebo, Vall d'Alcalà, Vall de Gallinera and Vall de Laguar) is being catastrophic.
The motives? The weather has caused production to be significantly reduced since these weather adversities cause a lack of pollination and fruit set. In 2018, which was a standard production season, a total of 700.000kg was collected, while in 2019 about 200.000kg was collected and in 2020 it dropped to 28.000kg. In 2021, 107.000 kg were collected, but the forecast for 2022 is a production loss of 99-100%.
Faced with these situations that once again cause great economic losses, the municipalities of les Valls in the interior of the region have asked the General State Administration to declare this point of the territory as a catastrophic zone.
In addition, it must be taken into account that the agricultural production of les Valls is marked by small farms and dry stone terraces located in an orography that makes the daily work of the families that have worked this crop since time immemorial difficult, in some municipalities marked by the increase in recent years of a notorious depopulation.
Objective: protect dry stone and the agricultural sector
Dry stone is recognized as Intangible Heritage of Humanity, for which the different municipalities affected jointly with Cerezas Montaña de Alicante COOP. CV urge all agricultural institutions and especially the Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development, Climate Emergency and Ecological Transition to take measures to protect and promote the conservation of this agricultural production, with the aim of achieving recognition of this situation of social and agrarian emergency that this area is suffering, as a result of the bad harvesting seasons of the last four years.
To this unfortunate situation, it must be added that almost the entire cherry agricultural sector is unprotected as it cannot insure its cherry harvest in the yield module due to the high cost of insurance, which is €0.35 - €0.50/kg. . For this reason, the farmer can only insure his harvest for the rains, leaving him without coverage when production is affected by flower set or other adverse effects.
An abandonment of 45% of the fields is expected in 5 years
If the cherry farming sector cannot ensure the harvest, when catastrophic seasons occur consecutively, as is happening now, many end up abandoning production. According to municipal sources, if the situation does not change, an abandonment of 45% of the fields is expected in the next 5 years.
Les Valls need the help of the institutions. Agricultural heritage is clearly the main economic pillar that sustains these municipalities, and other socioeconomic factors that affect the rural world depend on this sector: sustainable tourism, population density, maintenance of minimum services... It is evidence that if no urgent and forceful measures are taken in agriculture, it is doomed to disappear and with it, the peoples of the rural environment.
This cherry is the earliest in Spanish territory and is found within the appellation "Cerezas de la Montaña de Alicante" which was created in 1991 and is based in Alpatró (La Vall de Gallinera).
