Mallorca's territorial agony: five new villas built in rural areas every week between 2021 and 2024

PalmFive rural chalets built per week between 2021 and 2024: this is one of the figures reflecting the territorial destruction of Mallorca, made public this Thursday by Terraferida. The organization has resumed its activities and plans to tour towns across Mallorca to raise public awareness of the seriousness of the situation. A situation where no major action is being taken, because the urbanization process is diffuse but more destructive than ever.

Terraferida has completed the study Inventory of the devastation of Mallorca 2015-2024where it has classified and quantified the most recent urbanization processes. The latest period analyzed runs from 2021 to 2024, and the assessment is not very optimistic: during these three years, 546 hectares of agricultural and forest land in Mallorca were developed, most of which were used for 846 villas for residential and tourist use (57% of 2021-2024). "Strong, rapid, impactful, and widespread": this is how Terraferida activist Jaume Adrover described the urbanization of rural land in Mallorca, also highlighting that 80% of the island's territory is not protected and that only 15% is an ANEI (Area of Special Natural Interest).

Between 2015 and 2024, 1,391 hectares of land were consumed, an area equivalent to the entire municipality of Costitx (not just the town center). "The destruction has been done almost imperceptibly," noted Mateu Vic, representative of Terraferida. Of the total, 806 hectares were designated for residential and tourist use; 250 for photovoltaic power plants; 133 for facilities such as shooting ranges, polo fields, and equestrian centers; 85 for road infrastructure and parking lots; and the remainder for quarries, commerce, industry, services, and warehouses, among other uses.