Climate activists plugged holes in 10 golf courses across Spain to protest the amount of water used to maintain them as the country suffers amid a severe drought. Members of Extinction Rebellion (XR) Spain, along with activists from other climate groups, chose golf courses in six provinces, including Madrid, Valencia, Ibiza and Navarra. They planted seedlings in the holes while some also used cement to them. Protesters unfurled signs with phrases such as: “Alert: Drought! Golf closed for climate justice” and “water is a common good.”
Golf in Spain uses more water than the cities of Barcelona and Madrid combined, XR claimed. One hole on a golf course requires more than 22,000 gallons of water a day to maintain the area around it, the group said citing data from Spanish non-profit Ecologistas en Acción (Ecologists In Action).
The aim of the action was “to denounce the waste of water in the context of one of the worst droughts that Europe has suffered", the group said, adding that it wanted to point out the “cynicism of continuing to allow this type of elitist leisure while Spain dries up and the rural world suffers millions in losses due to the lack of water for their crops.”
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The group said it wanted to make it clear that “the rich and their leisure activities that waste essential resources are a luxury that we cannot afford.”
{{/usCountry}}The group said it wanted to make it clear that “the rich and their leisure activities that waste essential resources are a luxury that we cannot afford.”
{{/usCountry}}Spain has been in a long-term drought since the end of 2022. In April, temperatures in many cities in the country reached record high leading to severe drought which resulted in some reservoirs sinking to less than 10% of capacity as millions of hectares of crops across the country have been lost.
Between June 1 and 10, 60% of Spain was under “drought alert” conditions, as per the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.