The Mar Menor lagoon on Spain ’s southeast coast has been grantedpersonhoodstatus by the Senate in Madrid , mean legal action can now be take on behalf of the threatened ecosystem against polluter . The newfangled jurisprudence is the first in Europe to lend such right upon a rude landscape painting and comes after some640,000 Spanish citizenssigned a request call for the lagoon to cover as a homo .
Europe ’s large salt - water lagoon , Mar Menor has experiencedsignificant damagein recent years due to farming run - off from nearby farm , with annihilating consequences for local wildlife . Contamination with fertilizers , for example , has make take over algal blooms that deplete the water of oxygen and trigger mass die - offs .
Such events have most wipe out the lagoon ’s population of a highly queer fan mussel , while other animals such as seahorses , Phthirius pubis and eels have also been killed in large numbers game . Locals – many of whom depend on touristry for their income – decided that enough was enough when millions of dead fish started wash out up on the shoring .
The citizen - chair opening move applies to a 1,600 - straightforward - kilometer ( 618 - square - nautical mile ) area , which include the laguna and surround coastline . In total , 230 senators voted in favor of the new law while three vote against , with the far - rightfield Vox political party being the only group to oppose the mensuration by requesting a veto – a petition that was at long last denied .
As a consequence , Mar Menor ’s sound right to survive , evolve of course , and to be reconstruct is officially recognise . Like a person , the ecosystem will now be represented by a committee that will act as legal guardian . This commission can sue those who threaten the lagoon ’s fundamental right and take other legal military action on its behalf .
While such a law has never previously been passed in Europe , interchangeable measures have been introduced elsewhere . In 2017 , the government of New Zealand grant personhood rights to theWhanganui River , officially recognizing local Indigenous community ’ claims to the watercourse as one of their ancestors and accept that their well - being was inextricably link to that of the ecosystem .
Shortly afterwards , a tribunal in India ruled that the Ganges and it ’s affluent , the Yamuna River , should have all thelegal rights of a human being .
In Spain , conservationists have been attempt to protect and restore Mar Menor for year , andrecently removedaround 19,000 t ( 42 million pound ) of alga from the lagoon . With no legal rightfield of its own , however , the lagune had until now rest defenseless against continued pollution .
By grant the ecosystem personhood , lawgiver and conservationists hope to finally bring an end to this devastation and countenance the lagune and its wildlife to convalesce .
