Trouble in Paradise Part 1: Tourism’s Contribution to Mallorca’s Water Crisis

Greetings curious readers! I trust you are well! Today’s post aims to explore the link between tourism and freshwater scarcity on an island I’m sure several of you will hold very dear to your hearts after last year’s field course – Mallorca! Mallorca is a particularly relevant case study regarding tourism and water use as it’s experiencing the freshwater shortages and problems many tourism-intense islands will probably have to face in the near future. The island has the highest water consumption in the Balearics (~82.5% of their total water consumption), yet it's water resource is scarce. This is the same for most small Mediterranean and Pacific Islands where, unfortunately, a big proportion of global tourism is concentrated. According to the Falkenmark Index, Mallorca’s freshwater availability lies well below the threshold of total water scarcity throughout the entire year, meaning that the island's demand for water surpasses the long-term sustainable yield of it's natural water resources. This in turn has resulted in unsustainable over-exploitation of the freshwater, particularly groundwater, especially from unregulated users.

So how has tourism contributed to this?

Tourism is the number one economic sector for Mallorca, accounting for about 48% (almost ½!) of the Balearic's GDP. Although tourism accounted for about 12% of the Balearic Island’s total water consumption in 2011, the sector's demand is rising much more rapidly than the biggest water consumer: agriculture. For example, the tourism sector's water consumption increased by a huge 156% in the Balearic Islands’ from 1980-95, as opposed to a 22% fall for agriculture.

Furthermore, the pressure on Mallorca’s water supplies from tourism is really concentrated in a short space of time. Both Mallorca's annual precipitation and peak in tourist arrivals exhibit a strong seasonality - the problematic part being that the two do not in any way coincide. The 4 driest summer months experience under 10% of the year's rainfall and really high evapotranspiration rates as well as over ½ of all tourist arrivals (as illustrated in Figure 1). Thus tourism acts to superimpose the island's yearly periods of highest water demand and lowest natural water availability.

Figure 1. Mallorca's annual tourist arrivals distribution for the years 2001-2009. Source.

Furthermore, the absence of long-term surface water resources on the island means groundwater is the main renewable freshwater, yet even this is unreliable due its dependence on the island’s highly variable precipitation. Even over a decade ago, researchers were highlighting the link between tourism and groundwater resource stress, pointing out that the most overexploited aquifers are usually located in tourist resorts.

Since then, the argument continues, with more recent papers arguing overextraction due to high summer tourist consumption has caused lowering of the groundwater table and water quality via saltwater intrusion. Other negative impacts of the tourist pressure on water quality include nitrate infiltration due to overuse of fertilisers and pesticides in maintaining hotel gardens and golf courses. Overall this results in a reduction in total available drinking water (and subsequent increase in extraction cost) for both the tourism sector and the local residents. In the future, this state of water scarcity combined with increasing occurrence of drought under climate change could lead to conflicts between different sectors and the local residents. For example, Bali, another tourism-intense water-scarce island, is currently facing a water crisis due to intense tourism development, with groundwater resources being reduced to critical levels, causing conflicts between local villagers who need water for farming and the tourist sector, which uses up a whopping 65% of the island’s water supply yet makes up 80% of the island’s economy. Although the tourism usage rate is much higher than for Mallorca, climate change will likely reduce the island's total water supplies, meaning it could be facing a similar situation soon.

Tune into the next post for an analysis of water management strategies being taken by the tourism sector in Mallorca to reduce this problem!