We like good-looking, colorful fruits and vegetables in supermarkets, no matter what season it is. Bus what is the price for this?  A lot of in Germany consumed fruits and vegetables are imported from Almería in Spain. There is an area of 350 square kilometer of greenhouses and plastic foil under which grow tomatoes, pepper, melons and strawberries. Locals call this place “mar del plástico”, “sea of plastic”. And it is right: Almería slowly transforms into a contaminated desert of plastic with so many climate damaging consequences:
  • phreatic water decreases a lot and becomes salty
  • fossil water resources are pumped up, rivers are displaced and even pipelines in the north of Spain are taped
  • soil gets more infertile because of monocultures
  • mountains have to be removed to provide new cultivable land
  • vegetables which do not fit the norm rot in the streets
  • 40000 tons of replaced plastic foil per year are thrown in the landscape, this foil needs 500 years to rot
  • fertilizers and pest control are used, residue of pesticide on vegetables often exceed maximum values of the EU
  • the waste is disposed illegally, toxic waste often pollutes the lakes
  • animals of the area get sick
  • potable water is contaminated
  • workers do not have protective clothing, health insurance or medical help
  • they have to work up to 16 hours a day and they are paid under the minimum wage and not in time
  • temperature under the foil raises up to 60°C
  • every year about hundred workers die because of intoxication
  •  greenhouses are abandoned without regard to the environment and recycling
So many negative impacts, but who is guilty? The workers? The farmers? The entrepreneurs? The supermarkets that order the vegetables? Or the consumers, who guarantee the stable demand of good looking, climate damaging fruits and vegetables from Almería…

Written by: Luise Sasse

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Tomatoes from the sea of plastic in Almería, Spain