Unanimously, the Plenary of the Parliament of the Canary Islands approved this Wednesday the bill that extends the Malpaís de la Rasca Special Nature Reserve to its entire territory, 557 hectares (5,570,000 square meters). He did so in the presence of the mayor of the municipality where it is located, José Julián Mena, for whom “Arona and the South region today take a fundamental step in the protection of one of the few areas of its coastline that are not urbanized and that it has a high environmental, ethnographic and geological value, which will be preserved from urban pressure”.
Mena celebrated the decision of the regional Chamber, although the bill still has to go through the parliamentary process for its final approval. The opposition parties supported the initiative without objection, although there were those who regretted that the proponent parties (those that make up the Government of the Canary Islands) did not make them partners in the proposal given the coincidence of criteria that reigns in the matter.
“The area has a high environmental, ethnographic and geological value, which will be preserved from urban pressure”
The mayor of Arona thanked “the support given to this law by the different political groups, since We cannot talk about sustainability without concrete, courageous and coherent actions that allow us to preserve, for future generations, both the environment and our landscape and areas of high environmental and symbolic value, such as the Malpaís de la Rasca”.
Bearing in mind that this is one of the most important land protection initiatives in Canary Islands In recent years, the Councilor for the Environment, Leopoldo Díaz Oda, was also present in the Autonomous Chamber, as well as the mayor of Sí Podemos Arona, Antonella Aliotti.
José Julián Mena asked the Cabildo de Tenerife to extend the protection of the Malpaís de la Rasca during the previous term (2015-2019)a request that he reiterated in June of last year, at which time a legislative path began whose development has had the support of the Ministry of Ecological Transition, Fight against Climate Change and Territorial Planning.
The bill establishes a series of measures to avoid urban pressure on this space and modifies the annex for the reclassification of natural spaces in the Canary Islands, contained in Legislative Decree 1/2000, of May 8, which approves the Text Recast of the Canary Islands Territorial Planning Laws and Natural Spaces of the Canary Islands.
The Special Nature Reserve of Malpaís de la Rasca now covers 557.12 hectares by adding 244.42 hectares to the current 312.7. The extension extends from the El Palm-Mar Urbanization, continuing west to the coast and following it, heading south, to the current limit of the reserve in Caletón de los Goros. To the east, the limit grows to the TF-66 highway (Guaza-Las Galletas) and from here, in a southeasterly direction, to an agricultural track that, in a southwesterly direction, connects with the current limit of the Reserve. With all of this, all of its flora and fauna, the landscape, the geomorphological structure and the archaeological vestiges, unique in the Islands, are protected.
