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San Javier plots a greener future with plan to plant thousands more trees
City aims to boost vegetation cover from 19% to 30% within twenty years, after finishing fourth out of 544 projects nationwide
San Javier has set itself an ambitious target: transforming just under a fifth of the municipality's land into nearly a third green space by 2046. The Renaturalization Plan was unveiled this Monday in Almansa Park, and it's the result of months of fieldwork assessing exactly what the town needs.To hit that 30% figure, the town will need to plant a staggering 28,400 new trees, working out at around 1,420 a year until 2046. That's no small undertaking, but according to Susana Domínguez, the plan's coordinator, it's a necessary one. She explained that the strategy focuses on protecting existing trees first, then adding new ones strategically, choosing both location and species carefully given rising temperatures and increasingly scarce rainfall. "The first priority is maintaining what we have because, from now on, the increase in temperatures and the scarcity of rainfall require us to know what we plant and why we plant it," she said.
The plan isn't just about counting trees either. It includes ten lines of action and 25 specific measures, ranging from urgent fixes to long-term goals, and covers everything from new green spaces in areas currently lacking them to the creation of bio-forests and wooded areas around schools, hospitals and senior centres.Among the concrete next steps, councillor for Parks and Gardens María Dolores Ruiz has flagged two new green spaces planned for Los Pozuelos and Roda, along with a hundred new pine and other trees destined for the Parque de la Infancia. "It's possible," she said of the wider target.
Mayor José Miguel Luengo believes the plan lays solid foundations for the next twenty years of environmental work in the town, and hopes future administrations will build on it rather than let it stall.The project has real financial backing too, and some notable recognition behind it. San Javier's proposal, submitted for the 2030 Agenda grant scheme in 2024, ranked fourth out of 544 projects evaluated across the whole of Spain. The win brought in €199,916 in state funding, topped up with a further €49,979 from the Ayuntamiento, bringing the total budget to €249,895.
Inmaculada Torres, the Regional Director General of Natural Heritage and Climate Action, offered her department's support at the presentation, saying she was keen "to assist the City Council in the process." She added that "health isn't only cared for in health centres," pointing to the wider benefits trees bring to both the environment and the people who live among them.
The event wrapped up fittingly, with representatives from each institution planting seven trees together in Almansa Park, a small but symbolic start to two decades of work ahead.
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Image: Ayuntamiento de San Javier
