The water shortage problem that La Graciosa has suffered has revived the debate on the massification of the eighth island, which multiplies its population in summer. And although the supply was interrupted due to a breakdown, the reserves of the tanks were exhausted earlier due to increased consumption.
During the morning of this Tuesday, neighbors could be seen having to collect water from the cistern installed by Canal Gestión. Some carried up to 10 bottles in a wheelbarrow and others large vats, although the influx was not massive, as many still had some water in their cisterns. However, what happened has generated concern about what may happen in the future.
“As a resident of La Graciosa, it hurts me to see how my island is massified every summer”, says a neighbor, who has preferred to remain anonymous. Although she assures that she has not run out of water in her home, she does emphasize that “there are usually cuts”, especially in summer.
“I think it is possible to make a more sustainable tourism model”, she adds, stressing that the water problem is just “one more” of the island's problems due to uncontrolled tourism. “There are many who do not want to see, and they will become increasingly bigger”.
Another resident of La Graciosa points out that he has not run out of water in his home either, since he has a cistern that was not finished, but even so he considers that "it is third world that this happens in 2022 in La Graciosa”.
The breakdown was finally repaired on the afternoon of this Tuesday, but that also makes the residents of La Graciosa reflect. “What would have happened if the island had not been full of tourists? Would it have been fixed so quickly?”, another one asks.
“There will be consequences of the lack of control in the summer”
No one doubts that La Graciosa lives directly from tourism. Restaurants, bicycle companies, vacation rentals and supermarkets subsist on the number of people who come to the island, and perhaps that is why all the people La Voz has spoken to have preferred that their names not be published.
One of them is precisely dedicated to vacation rentals, but even so she is alarmed by the situation on the island. “We, the residents of La Graciosa, are going to suffer the problem of what is happening, because the summer will pass and there will be consequences of the lack of control that there has been, I hope I am wrong”, she points out.
In addition, she underlines the shortcomings that La Graciosa has in essential services, such as water but also telephony, the lack of local police or the need for "reinforcements" in the health system. “I don't know if anyone has considered what would happen if there were two accidents on the island at the same time”, she warns.
“Let's be objective and build an island with a future. We depend on tourism, we must not forget the model we have”, she adds, emphasizing the need to perfect that model before it is too late, since she assures that her greatest fear is “that they will start to prohibit” activities on the island.
However, the possibility of regulating tourism is not an option that everyone considers. "There is not going to be a way to control it. I am working in tourism and that massification is not good, but I don't think there is another option if we want to continue living from it”, another neighbor counters.
