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ENVIRONMENT

KEY STATS: What you need to know about Spain’s mega farms

Spain’s mega farms have been making headlines ever since the country’s Consumer Affairs Minister told The Guardian they were damaging the environment. Here’s how many large-scale livestock farms there are in Spain, where they are located and how much they pollute.

KEY STATS: What you need to know about Spain's mega farms
From 2007 to 2020, pork production increased by 36 percent in Spain. Stock photo: RONALDO SCHEMIDT / AFP)

At least 7,100 mega farms 

Mega farms, called macrogranjas in Spanish, isn’t an officially recognised word yet but has been coined by environmental groups to refer to intensive livestock facilities that house thousands of penned-in animals in an enclosed facility. 

In many ways they resemble a factory with an assembly line rather than a farm where livestock can roam free. 

According to Spain’s State Register of Pollutant Emissions and Sources (PRTR), there are 7,100 industrial facilities of this nature across Spain. 

A total of 53 percent of them – 3,392 – are large-scale poultry and pig facilities, with tens of thousands more small and medium farms accross the country. 

As things stand, cattle farms in Spain do not have to report emissions to the PRTR, something the Spanish government is reportedly working on changing.

There are 69,126 farms rearing calves in Spain, but only 3,730 of them have more than 100 cows. 

There isn’t an official figure to determine when a farm becomes a mega farm, but pig farms with more than 750 pigs and poultry facilities with more than 40,000 birds have to report their emissions.  

What’s the problem with mega farms? 

In an article in early January in The Guardian, Spain’s Consumer Affairs Minister Alberto Garzón said: “what isn’t at all sustainable is these so-called mega farms. They find a village in a depopulated part of Spain and put in 4,000, or 5,000 or 10,000 head of cattle”.

“They pollute the soil, they pollute the water and then they export this poor-quality meat from these ill-treated animals”.

His comments have caused an uproar from the Spanish meat industry, other politicians and from senior members of the ruling Socialists, causing divisions in Spain’s coalition government.

But was Garzón right? The minister was referring to mega farms in particular, not those with more sustainable models. 

From 2007 to 2020, pork production increased by 36 percent in Spain, which is the biggest pork products exporter in the world.

Last December, the EU took Spain to court for violating the limits for nitrate pollutants in water and soil caused by agro-livestock waste.

The recent environmental disaster in Murcia’s Mar Menor, where thousands of dead fish washed up on Spain’s southeastern coastline, is scientifically proven to have been largely caused by intensive farming and the ensuing eutrophication, an environmental hazard that causes aquatic ecosystems to collapse due to a lack of oxygen in the water.

READ MORE: Five stats to understand why Spain’s Mar Menor is full of dead fish

One of the other main impacts of large-scale intensive livestock farming is the emission of methane, a gas with a greenhouse effect potential about 20 times greater than CO2 according to the UN.

Spain’s mega farms produced 99 million kilos of methane in 2020, according to PRTR data.

Spain has also failed to comply with the EU’s emission limits of ammonia into the atmosphere from 2010 to 2019.

In theory, all farms in Spain that exceed the PRTR’s emission levels need to report this and get a specific authorization and environmental impact statement to continue operating.

But the discontent and concern among Spain’s rural communities is palpable, with many residents demanding an end to intensive pig farming and fearing the impact on groundwater and on their quality of life from untreated manure from the animals.

And for the animals themselves, mega farms mean a horrible life trapped indoors with often only one square metre per pig, unhealthy living conditions which cause disease, stress, cannibalism and pre-mature death. 

READ MORE: Spain’s countryside rises up against ‘pig factories’

Where are Spain’s mega farms? 

The three regions in Spain where the majority of ‘macro farms’ intended for the intensive rearing of poultry or pigs are Aragón (922), Catalonia (856) and Castilla y León (582), all in the northern half of the country. 

In Catalonia, 41 percent of aquifers are contaminated by animal waste and 142 municipalities suffer from water supply problems. In Aragón, the water of 18 percent of municipalities is contaminated by pig waste.

Of the 115 large dairy farms across Spain, 32 are in Catalonia, 19 in Castilla y León, 12 in Castilla-la Mancha and 11 in Navarra.

Location of large farms in the poultry and pig sector that report emissions in Spain. Source: Spanish Environment Ministry

The largest farms for rearing cows for meat production are in Castilla y León (1,268) and Extremadura (1,157).

Livestock farming is responsible for some 2.5 million jobs in the country and accounts for €9 billion ($10 billion) in annual exports, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

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TERRORISM

Spain sees heightened terror risk amid global conflicts

Amid rising tensions and conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza and elsewhere around the world, a meeting by Spain's National Security Council has identified several threats to national security, some pre-existing and some new.

Spain sees heightened terror risk amid global conflicts

Global conflict and instability has raised the terror and security risk in Spain. This is what Spain’s National Security Council (CSN) has concluded following a meeting with government ministers on Tuesday to approve security reports and outline new anti-terror strategies. A 61-page document was compiled to replace the previous one approved in 2019 and will be valid for five years.

Among the topics discussed, which are outlined here on the National Security Council website, were the ongoing conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine and the heightened security threats they pose to Spain.

The war in Gaza, the Council states, presents “a real and direct risk” of an increase in “the terrorist threat, violent extremism and the emergence of new movements that promote a radical and violent ideology.”

READ ALSO: Spain could enforce conscription of ordinary citizens if there is war

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the document stresses, is also “a potential catalyst for terrorism”, as it “has led to an increase in the circulation of arms and explosives [in Europe], as well as the participation in the war of volunteer fighters of other nationalities”.

These uncertain global conditions could be exploited by groups or individuals “to undermine public security”, the document adds, and suggests that “state actors could carry out terrorist actions,” in what appears to be an allusion to the assassination of a Russian soldier in Alicante earlier in the year.

READ ALSO: Mystery surrounds death of Russian helicopter deserter in Spain

The meeting and report also outlined broader “risks and threats to national security” grouped into 16 categories, some older and long-established, some much more modern. They range from terrorism and violent radicalisation to the effects of climate change, space vulnerability, cyberspace, organised crime, migratory flows, foreign espionage and interference from abroad.

The CSN detects growing dangers to Spanish airspace, namely “events of commercial satellite launches from aerial platforms crossing controlled airspace, events of re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere of satellite launcher debris, uncontrolled hot air balloon overflights and an increase in drone overflights over military bases,” things that have all been noted in Spain in recent years.

In terms of terrorism, despite the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine Islamic terrorism remains the greatest threat to Spanish security. “The repeated dismantling of the leaderships of Daesh and Al Qaeda has not succeeded in eliminating these groups, which act in a more decentralised manner than in previous years,” the report states.

During the period covered by the previous security strategy (2019-2023) “more than 110 [security] operations related to terrorism activities have been carried out,” more than 90 of which were linked to jihadist terrorism, the document details. Just 5 percent were linked to domestic terrorism.

Foreign spies operating in Spain were also highlighted as a threat. The CSN report stated that the decision to expel 27 Russian diplomats from Spain at the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was useful in this regard. “These expulsions significantly reduced their ability to operate on European territory, which led to a notable decrease in the rate of activity of foreign intelligence services in Spain,” the report states.

READ ALSO: Judge in Spain extends probe into Catalan separatist’s ‘Russia ties’

However, the potential threat from the Kremlin is again mentioned as the driving force behind the barrage of hoaxes and disinformation campaigns. In the case of Spain, Moscow reportedly “focuses on trying to spread a distorted image of migration in the Mediterranean and the situation in Ceuta and Melilla”.

But it’s not just the Russians attempting to misinform the public in Spain. The report also points to “official Chinese media and their propagandists on social networks in Spanish have amplified many pro-Russian narratives”, with messages “based on expressing a rejection of the US and the current international order”.

The report lists 83 Russian disinformation incidents and 12 Chinese in the last year alone. Among these, several were aimed at “creating mistrust” in Spain’s electoral processes.

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