The struggle for land: livestock breeding and wind farms

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In the area of Ortegal, recent history has seen the development of a strong agricultural cooperative tradition. Examples of it are the Cooperativa a Devesana or the Cooperativa Agrortegal, two collective-action organizations created out of the strength of the local population and its belief in land-based agriculture and livestock farming as the main economic activity that will improve its quality of life. Community insurance to face the loss of animals, the first transfers of Frisian embryos in Spain, and free-stall and robotic barns are some of the advances achieved in this sea-battered coast. For some time, production was high and genetic improvement programs were implemented, but then the activity progressively declined. This was due to policy changes that led to the establishment of milk quotas that restricted production and caused a persistent asymmetry with other livestock sectors in the world market, for both the purchase price of inputs and the sale price of the milk were imposed. It became very difficult to hold on. The farms that survived were, in most cases, those that maintained their economic margin by producing their own fodder and by practicing pastoralism. This strategy depends of course on the territory: small plots that cannot be pastoralized because of large flocks, or mechanized, make the farms unviable.

The territorial base of livestock breeding and wind farming

Land is at the heart of the problem created by the Badulaque wind farm that the multinational Enel plans to build in this area. The company sent a mediator to Ortigueira who presented an offer to the local landowners specifying both the amount of money that the company would pay and the size of the affected area. As a result, there are livestock farms, some of them organic, facing a situation that may compromise their delicate social and economic balance. In other words, the terms of the company’s proposal would lead to the deterioration rather than to the improvement of the economic situation of local agricultural and livestock farms.
This is precisely the case of the Granxa Vidueira, located in Ermo, Ortigueira. It is a 70-hectare organic farm with 80 heads of livestock which produces both meat and milk. It is currently transitioning to becoming an organic beef farm only by implementing grazing practices and producing its own fodder.
We visited Andrés Saavedra García, a young man who is the current owner of this family farm and the keeper of a tradition that goes back several generations. He shared his deep concern, first of all, for the lack of a neccesary generational turnover that would secure the future of Ermo, Caxigueira and other villages in the area of Ortegal, and, secondly, for what he feels is a new threat to those communities: the Badulaque wind farm.

The threat of the Badulaque wind farm

Enel offers Granxa Vidueira an annual payment of EUR 5,367.60 for the use of a 15,060 m2 area. But the farm’s owner affirms that the affected area will be in fact 64.2% larger, reaching as many as 24,743 m2. This larger impact is calculated by including the area that cannot be used to rationally exploit the resources, because it is divided into small plots by the roads designed to access the wind turbines. This will happen not only in Ermo, but also in the villages of Pereiro and Veiga, in the municipality of Frailes, where whole farms are rendered useless through the division of pastures. Andrés’ calculations are very simple, as shown on the following table:

Land occupied by wind farms and land with no production capacity because of its subdivision into smaller plots experience two types of loss: that of the output that cannot be produced and sold, and that of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) payment that the farm will not receive. Enel is not taking any of these two losses into account in its proposal. In 2023, the farms entitled to direct CAP payments received 1,161.77 EUR/ha. Neither that amount, nor the income that would be generated by selling the farm’s output are considered by the company. Andrés’ calculations are right.
Enel has proposed an annual payment of 0.36 EUR/m2 to compensate the impact on the affected area, as estimated by them. But if we take into account the CAP income support that the farmer will not receive, the payment is actually reduced to 0.24 EUR/m2, almost 33% less. When Andrés Saavedra calculates the actual area affected by the construction of the wind farm and then deducts the money that his farm will not be paid through the CAP, the resulting amount drops down to 0.10 EUR/m2, which is almost 72% lower than the one offered by Enel. If he also took into consideration the loss in production, the payment provided by the company would not compensate what the farm would earn otherwise. Renting out their land to the energy company is a ruinous business for livestock farms.

The numbers are very clear: the company will produce thousands of megawatt hour and make millions of euros, but local farmers will lose their lands and their incomes. The Galician and Spanish Governments, who are responsible for deciding on this matter, should not allow the paying of Paul (the production of decarbonized electricity) at the expense of Peter (the destruction of agrarian life in rural communities). Unless they recognize this unfair situation and take it upon themselves to rectify these injustices, these rural areas will soon be abandoned.

Andrés and his parents, Antonio and Adelaida, who also attended the meeting at the Observatory, no longer know what to do. Antonio believes in land-based livestock farming, champion rural life, loves farming and considers it a decent way of living, but the helplessness he and his family feel is growing by the week. Not only because of the impact that the wind park will have on their organic livestock farm, but also due to other powerful reasons related to the project. “Whatever will happen to our water?”, he asked. Less than 100 m away from the base of one of the future wind turbines, there is a water spring authorized by the Galician Government that flows over rocks. “If they want to build a wind turbine in that place, they will have to use a lot of dynamite. And what if the water spring is lost as a result of the explosion?”, Antonio wondered. When the claims to the project were submitted, this issue was taken into consideration but the authorities stated that the wind farm would not cause any significant damage to this asset, which is so important to the community. In the neighboring village of Penoseira, there are houses less than 500 m away from where the wind turbines will stand. In Caxigueira, where Manuel Penabaz’s model farm is located, the destruction of land is also considerable, Andrés says.
According to both Andrés’ parents and Suso Permui, a member of the Plataforma Ortegal Di Non (Ortegal Says No Platform), Enel’s initial plans, which were the ones made public, showed different effects from those considered in the current plan. “We did not have a chance to make any claims to the final proposal”, Suso Permui complained.

In summary

In the words of Andrés’ mother, Adelaida, better known as Maruxa, “They act as if they own everything, we feel unprotected”. And she added, “Our parents and grandmothers fought for this land, for livestock farming, for our future… now we only seem to own this land in order to pay the property tax. It is very unfair”.
Andrés made a last remark that we wish to mention. He said, “This wind farm was initially authorized, but the company made a substantial modification to the project and requested a new permit. Despite being submitted after the standstill of the wind-power industry was imposed by the Galician Government, the project was not affected by the new norm establishing a bigger minimum distance from the houses to the wind farm. How is that possible?”.
Andrés and his family, like many other families in Galician rural areas, are open-minded and well aware of the environmental problems that our planet and this region are facing. They are the first to defend nature, to care for it and protect it. But they also love their village and their way of living, and do not want to see them further endangered by this project. Enel’s wind park, which has the support of the Galician and Spanish governments, is threatening their way of living and their sustenance. How long will it be, or what changes will need to be implemented, before the rural world stops being treated as the backyard of the high and mighty, including foreign companies, and becomes the master of its own destiny?