Improvement of the irrigation network of Valle Gran Rey has been awarded to a Gomeran company with a budget close to 1,5 million euros, funded by the State Government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, and an execution time of 12 months. The president of the Island Council specifies that "it will be the agricultural processing enterprise Tragsa who will be responsible to carry out this important project, which favors agriculture and allows recovering and preserving of abandoned arable land."

Curbelo expresses his confidence in the imminent construction works, which aim to avoid the recession suffered by the agricultural soil and contribute to the preservation of the natural environment of the municipality. According to the details of the initiative, current irrigation ditches will be replaced by galvanized steel pipes, water intakes will be improved providing them with filtering structures, and various regulator depots will be cleaned and repaired, in order to reduce the water deficit suffered at the lower valley and facilitate the work of farmers, introducing localized irrigation on the parcels.

The area affected by the project, which has been entrusted by the General Secretary of Agriculture and Food by 1.346.231,08 euros, and is located within the Natural Protected Area of Valle Gran Rey Rural Park, in a zone of Community importance, is 132 hectares, divided into two zones within the valley which has abundant crops of bananas, vegetables and subtropical fruit.

"It is this particular location in the Rural Park which forced us to request environmental impact reports, which were finally resolved in a positive way by the Ministry of Environment, following a favorable report by the Insular Board of Protected Areas on La Gomera”, states the maximum representative of the island.

Water is a limiting factor for agriculture in Valle Gran Rey, and is mostly obtained from natural outcrops. The valley head has the most important natural springs on the island, from where the precious liquid is conducted in irrigation ditches which are in defective state and, therefore, generate losses that should be avoided. "Accordingly any action such as the forthcoming project, which serves to maintain farming activity and improve water management, will have a positive impact on other environmental factors and consequently the conservation of the ecosystem and the existing landscape", Curbelo concludes.