The Government, the Junta and the municipalities carry out a symbolic sowing of seeds in the area of the fire. The active collaboration between all the administrations is highlighted.
The recovery work of the area burned in the fire of Las Peñuelas took an important step yesterday morning. To the well-known place of Cuesta Maneli various authorities moved to proceed to a symbolic planting of seeds of native species in the area. Thus, the event was attended by the Minister of Environment and Land Management, José Fiscal; the subdelegate of the Government in Huelva, Asunción Grávalos, and the mayors of the municipalities of Almonte, Palos de la Frontera, Moguer and Lucena del Puerto, in whose territorial demarcations the fatal fire took place.
Also present, in addition to the institutional representation, was the director of the family business Semillas Cantueso, José Ángel Cantueso, who came from Córdoba to provide the material altruistically. Representatives of Bomberos Unidos Sin Fronteras (BUSF), who have been mobilizing to raise funds for the reforestation of Doñana, also attended the event.
On the other hand, the directors and technicians of the Doñana Natural Area traveled to the site located in the Médano del Asperillo, in what was a meeting and collaboration point between the different institutions, in addition to the union between the public and private spheres.
Fiscal stated that the symbolic planting is done in an area "in which the collaboration of the different administrations has been made evident", since it is an area in which both restoration and erosion prevention tasks have been carried out, financed by the Government of Spain with technical direction by the Junta de Andalucía.
For the Minister of Environment and Land Management, this is an opportunity to "show the commitment of the Junta de Andalucía to recover this area as soon as possible" and stressed that the way of working has always been joint, referring to the "logical presence of the subdelegate of the Government", both yesterday and since the beginning, "when the fire was still active" and the working group for the restoration was created.
In the same way, Asunción Grávalos stressed the "collaboration, which we already showed during the fire and now we do it here in the reforestation of the area". Grávalos, in addition to thanking the presence of those gathered there, expressed her interest that this "symbolic act serves to strengthen the collaboration between administrations".
The mayoress of Almonte, Rocío Espinosa, expressed her gratitude to all the institutional representatives for their presence and emphasized the interest of the company Semillas Cantueso, which, as the mayoress herself pointed out, came "to bring the seeds to sow the future", which "has to be to return the landscape to this wonderful place where we live", she said.
The mayor expressed her hopes that "this solidarity, commitment and respect" would continue to be perpetuated in the wake of "a misfortune like this". Espinosa pointed out that it is important to learn from nature and from possible mistakes that may be made so that they do not happen again.
In this regard, Carmelo Romero, mayor of Palos de la Frontera, pointed out the importance of conservation so that the fire would not have taken place. In this way, Romero appealed to the whole society in general urging to "take care of our nature, our landscapes" and for this, he said, "we have to work" with the aim of "that these landscapes are preserved" and do not need work like those that yesterday and during the last ten months have been carried out. The message of the mayor of Palermo was clear: "It is better to take care of nature than to have to repair it later".
In addition to the different personalities, in Cuesta Maneli the element that monopolized the spotlight were the seeds, scattered in the lands that are located "downwind", that is, protected from the wind, "because the element that most wears out the vegetation" in areas such as Cuesta Maneli is the wind, which causes the seed germination process can be dragged by the sand and does not take root, as explained Miguel Angel Maneiro, director of the working group that carries out the restoration work.
Maneiro pointed out that although it is necessary to wait a year to start the reforestation of the entire burned area, there are areas that cannot wait, such as Cuesta Maneli, or some streams in the area of Arroyo del Loro, whose planting is "always linked to the prevention of an environmental risk" not for wanting to "recover the vegetation itself" before the year, which is the deadline to wait to observe and evaluate the response of the environment to the fire.
Semillas Cantueso is one of the collaborating entities of the Junta de Andalucía for the conservation of the native flora and they did not hesitate to collaborate from the days immediately following the environmental tragedy.
The director of the company pointed out that what they intend from this family business with the delivery of the grains is that this activity "serves as an example" about that "the public-private collaboration can be carried out without any type of distrust". Likewise, Cantueso made a call so that "other companies of greater economic capacity and of greater size" than his "take the path that it is necessary to bet for the environment". He said that "the environment in our country is not sufficiently considered", so that meetings of this type can serve "to make us become aware that caring for nature is the future of all of us".
Cuesta Maneli, which is located in the Médano del Asperillo natural area, was one of the areas most devastated by the fire. In this area, burned trees were cut down and fajinas were created with the branches of the burned trees to prevent wind erosion, since it is a dune area very close to the sea that is completely exposed to the wind. Yesterday, the seeds were scattered on the land that is protected by these fajinas, which everyone hopes will do their job.
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Text: AMELIA UCEDA / Video: JOSUÉ CORREA
