The rustic amnesty puts figures to the destruction of the countryside
Hundreds of houses, swimming pools and other structures advance towards legality thanks to the Government's measures
PalmaPollença is currently processing 360 files to legalize houses and construction elements on rural land. Sant Josep de sa Talaia (Ibiza) has 235 in hand, although it has rejected 26 for not meeting the requirements. There is no global figure, because the councils, despite having the obligation to oversee rural land, have neglected the process and do not supervise it. "The town halls do it directly," sources from the island governments of Mallorca, Menorca, and Ibiza have responded to ARA Balears. But, if two important municipalities add up to more than 500 files, it is clear that the rural amnesty approved by the Government of Marga Prohens has had a very significant reception. The measure has served to portray the agony of rural land, and "the complete failure as a society", in the words of the head of Urban Planning of Pollença, Tomeu Antich, when it comes to enforcing the law and discipline in rural territory, fundamental for biodiversity, agriculture, landscape generation, and cultural preservation.
In Pollença, the avalanche was foreseeable due to the long history of rural illegalities in the municipality, which includes some houses that for years have been and are dedicated to holiday rentals. The Town Hall has had to mobilize resources and reinforce Urban Planning with a lawyer and an architect to deal with files that require reconstructing the urban planning history of each property: going to the archive, checking what was built and when, and determining what has expired and what has not. "This is the key element, especially in protected areas," summarizes Antich.
In recent decades, construction has been carried out irregularly not only on common rural land, but also on land of scenic interest and high protection areas. The avalanche has been greater in Mallorca and the Pitiuses than in Menorca, where it has not been possible to build on rural land since 2003 and it is more difficult to sneak a building into the control systems.
L’ARA Balears has been able to ascertain how some of the files processed by Sant Josep correspond to large houses with swimming pools. A property developer is processing four of them. “They are not tool sheds built for going to have a paella, as the Government has wanted to imply,” explains a civil servant who requests anonymity. Many of them are villas that have been permitted, especially by town councils that have not ceded disciplinary powers to the Council, which is what they all should do.”
Along the same lines, the manager of Urban Planning in Pollença assures that the 360 files they are processing do not correspond to a single profile. “In Pollença there are entire homes, but also houses from the 1950s to which extensions, annexes, and swimming pools have subsequently been added without a license. Some are on protected rural land. And there are also homes dedicated to tourist activity with a vacation license. “They are taking advantage to get in order,” explains Antich.
The amnesty has highlighted what can be verified by walking through the countryside: if hundreds of legalization files are now entering certain town councils, how much was built for decades outside the law on rural land?
From the tool shed to the villa with a pool
The spokesperson for Terraferida, Jaume Adrover, admits that extraordinary regularization can make sense for a certain type of building. “That small house that grandparents built, which is inherited and has no papers and cannot be extended or have a beam changed,” he gives as an example. Constructions from the 70s and 80s that were made irregularly, and which today cannot be demolished because the infraction has prescribed, but cannot be legalized either.
According to Adrover, the problem is that this profile is a minority among what is emerging. “We see massive entries of hundreds of legalization projects in each town hall.” Among the cases they know are chalets, extensions, and swimming pools. “The level of illegality is lamentable,” he adds.
The figures from the Official College of Architects of the Balearic Islands give an idea of the magnitude. By mid-2025, 1,040 extraordinary regularization projects had been endorsed, 571 of which were homes. Legalizations were one of the main factors in the increase in endorsed architectural activity.
The files continue to come in. To the 360 from Pollença and the 235 from Sant Josep, 85 are added in Inca since the last quarter of 2025, 43 in Calvià – 5 already have a license – and 60 in Alcúdia.
Extraordinary regularization is only possible when the infraction has prescribed. This inevitably leads to another question: how is it possible that so many works came to prescribe without the Administration acting?
“It should not have gone this way,” says Antich. According to the manager of Urban Planning of Pollença, regularization should be accompanied by a commitment to the future: “If we set the clock to zero, let nothing more happen on rustic land.” “There is no guarantee that this will be the case. On the contrary, there was already a regularization years ago, and these measures convey the idea that, if you can avoid the law, it's better. Someone will come to legalize you,” says Adrover.
The municipal technicians consulted point out a weakness in the system: that urban planning enforcement is in the hands of local councils. Mallorca has the Agency for Land Defense (ADT), which can assume inspection, sanctioning, and the restoration of legality in rural areas through municipal delegation, but this delegation is voluntary. “The Agency should be in charge of enforcement for all town halls, because proximity to the citizen never works well,” observes Antich. The head of Urban Planning for Alcúdia, Rafel Ferrer (PP), agrees: “It’s hard to go against a neighbor.” And he admits that “the town halls should have been more diligent in the matter of enforcement.”
To proximity is added the lack of resources. Pollença has delays and a lack of technical staff, and now has to absorb hundreds of legalizations. “Legislation is made from above, but without taking into account the lack of resources we have,” laments Antich.
Focusing the problem of rural land solely on illegality would be misleading. While hundreds of irregular buildings emerge, the legal transformation of the countryside has also not stopped. The latest data from Terraferida indicate that between 2021 and 2024 alone, 546 hectares of agricultural and forest land in Mallorca were urbanized. 57% corresponds to residential and tourist housing: 846 chalets built or expanded in four years, practically five each week. A quarter corresponds to photovoltaic installations.
A rural chalet does not only occupy the surface area of the house. It implies access roads, parking areas, vehicles, fences, gardens, water consumption, and often, a swimming pool. Between 2015 and 2021, 1,765 new swimming pools were built on rural land in Mallorca. Antich explains that in Pollença they notice it on the roads: the intensity of use has skyrocketed, as have the complaints. It is the consequence of progressively transforming an agricultural territory into a dispersed residential space.
The College of Architects has warned of the problem. The dean, Bernat Nadal, has argued in various professional and business meetings that rural territory "must never lose protection" and has also called for construction to begin to be limited there. If the territory is not protected, he warns, the Islands could become "a cardboard set". According to entities like GOB_Mallorca, "we must learn from those who have done well." "In Menorca in 2003, rustic land was declared non-buildable. It is the measure we require, even though the left did not apply it," says the vice-president of the entity, Tonina Siquier.
Municipal legalization files depict a constant scenario of territorial transformation in the countryside: swimming pools, barbecues, strange and very impactful structures that have been transforming the rural territory coexist with solar parks that have been filling the outskirts. “Anything but the original purpose, food production,” laments Jaume Adrover, from Terraferida.For farmers, the issue is more basic. “Without territory, there is no farming,” says Joan Gaià, coordinator of Unió de Pagesos. Gaià believes that Mallorca is “finishing off the goose that lays the golden eggs,” the landscape and the territory, and warns of the direct competition between the agricultural and real estate value of the land. “If we turn everything into plots, as there are 15,000-meter plots, it’s a tragedy.” When the value of a farm depends on what can be sown on it, the farmer can aspire to buy or rent it. When it depends on the possibility of building a house with a swimming pool or obtaining tourist income from it, it is difficult to compete. Gaià assures that some farmers have been offered money to stop cultivating a farm. And there is another resource in dispute: water. Unió de Pagesos has received complaints from farmers about the pressure on wells while they need this resource to maintain food production.The phenomenon has another side. The Councilor for Urban Planning of Alcúdia, Rafel Ferrer, admits that some chalets built on rustic land have been used for tourist rental, but recalls the role that these incomes have played for many family economies. “This allows us to pay for our children’s studies, and everyone has to look at the economy a bit too,” he says. “There needs to be a balance,” he adds. Joan Gaià has been explaining it in a simpler way for a long time: “If we eat the countryside, we will eat chalets.”
