The organizations for the defense of the natural heritage of Lanzarote, Ecologistas en Acción Lanzarote, Desert Watch, Papacria and Lanzarote Tiene un Límite, express their "deep concern about the imminent celebration of the Isla de los Volcanes Rally, scheduled for August 8 and 9, which includes sections through areas of high environmental sensitivity that had previously been excluded, and demand the immediate suspension of those sections due to the serious impact it would have on Lanzarote's biodiversity."
The Lanzarote organizations denounce that the rally retakes the section (Jable de Soo, La Santa-Soo-Tinajo section) that was already eliminated from 2022 as a result of a report issued by the Department of Ecological Transition of the Government of the Canary Islands specifically indicating that this section is the habitat of steppe birds, endangered species, and crosses a natural habitat of community interest with a star onion population, as is also the case with the section between Tinajo and La Santa.
These associations "are very surprised that the Cabildo of Lanzarote has authorized the rally in the most sensitive areas that were expressly the subject of the aforementioned negative report because this automobile activity is incompatible with biodiversity", significantly affecting the habitat of at least 85 protected species, including four endangered species: the Egyptian vulture, the Canary Islands houbara bustard, the Canary Islands raven, and the Barbary falcon.
"We want to make it clear that either the Cabildo has not requested a mandatory report from the Government of the Canary Islands and has therefore failed to comply with Law 21/2013 on Environmental Assessment, or the latter has failed to comply with that law if it has issued a positive report this year." Therefore, the complaining associations have registered a request for access to the rally file in the Department of the Environment of the Cabildo of Lanzarote in order to find out how this situation of environmental regression has been reached on an island that is a Biosphere Reserve.
Finally, they state that "the use of the logo in the rally of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan of the Government of Spain, which is financed by the EU, will also be brought to the attention of the corresponding EU body, given that the fund requires compliance with the principle of not causing significant harm to the environment."
