The regional president of Andalusia, Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla, is under fire for blatant hypocrisy: claiming to defend farmers while overseeing the destruction of their land for industrial-scale solar and wind projects.
Speaking in Brussels on May 15th—the feast of St. Isidore, patron saint of farmers—Bonilla called for urgent support for European agriculture, declaring that “food sovereignty is food security” and urging a stronger EU farming policy.
But just one day earlier, more than 50,000 citizens had delivered petitions to the regional parliament in Seville, demanding an end to the mass uprooting of olive trees in rural Andalusia. Local campaign groups SOS Rural and Campiña Norte warn that around 500,000 olive trees—many hundreds of years old—are being cut down to make space for dozens of solar parks planned across the region.
The southern region of Andalusia is one of Spain’s key agricultural heartlands, especially known for its olive oil production. In the small town of Lopera, for example, 42,600 olive trees are due to be removed, wiping out a quarter of the town’s income and costing an estimated €3.1 million a year in wages and lost production.
Environmentalists argue that the destruction undermines the very climate goals these renewable projects claim to support. Mature olive trees absorb far more carbon dioxide than young trees—up to 570 kg per year, according to local researchers—making their removal a net loss for the environment.
“This doesn’t make sense,” said Natalia Corbalán, national spokeswoman for SOS Rural. “You can’t destroy the best natural carbon sinks in the name of sustainability.”
Meanwhile, farmers say they are being pressured to lease their land under threat of forced expropriation. “It’s development by coercion,” said Rafael Alcalá of Campiña Norte.
Anger has grown further with the announcement of a massive wind farm project in the province of Málaga, planned by a Norwegian state-owned company. If approved, it would be the largest in Andalusia, with new infrastructure cutting through farmland in multiple villages. It will join more than 140 wind parks already operating in the region.
The only party opposing the plans in the Andalusian parliament is VOX, a nationalist right-wing party. Its spokesman, Manuel Gavira, accused the two main national parties—Spain’s centre-right Popular Party (to which Bonilla belongs) and the Socialist Party—of sacrificing local farming communities to meet EU energy targets. Gavira also slammed Brussels for funding olive plantations in Morocco while allowing historic groves in Spain to be torn up.
Campaigners insist they are not against renewable energy—but argue it must not come at the cost of Spain’s rural economy and centuries-old agricultural traditions.