Intensive agriculture, wetlands, quarries and water management. A case study (Campo de Dalias, SE Spain)

The intensive agricultural activities that have developed over the last 50 years in the Campo de Dalias (Almeria region) have required large quantitie s of gravel and clay as the basic materials for the substrate over which cr ops are raised. With this motive, numerous gravel pits have been opened tha t have extracted several million cubic metres of material in recent years, Similar quantities of clay have been extracted from the distal sectors of t he alluvial fans that descend from the Sierra de Gador, and from within a l arge endoreic basin. In the latter quarries, some wetlands have developed, probably because of the rise in the watertable level in the aquifer over wh ich they lie. The gravel pits are situated in the apical sectors of the all uvial fans, overlying hydrogeological units that are widely overexploited. For this reason the gravel pits could be used for artificial recharge; in a ddition to increasing the availability of water in the aquifer, the risk of catastrophic flooding would also be reduced.