Public statement from Eastern Partaloa Residents’ Association regarding the proposed “chicken farm” in Piedra Amarilla.

Partaloa town hall has sent to Dip.Almeria a proposal to build an industrial scale broiler “chicken farm” just over 1km north of Piedra Amarilla village.

The recently acquired parcela involved is within 500 metres of many residential houses, and even a group of 8 homes in direct line of sight less than 300 metres away.

A meeting of concerned citizens was held at The Courtyard Bar, Piedra Amarilla on Tuesday July 20th. Legal representation and expert advice have been sought. A petition with over 180 signatures from local inhabitants to date is already in place. These measures are initially to protect residents and to submit our objections to this proposal to the authorities.

The “chicken farm” is not a continuance or expansion of a traditional chicken farmer’s family business, is not a traditional agricultural activity for this area, but would be a factory operation where no such thing has existed before, producing many many broiler chickens each year. It would be very close to houses, producing appalling smells that would spread over the whole municipality.

Environmental issues including airborne pollution, disease, noise, excess traffic exceeding local road limits, improper access to the site, waste disposal, and devaluation of residents’ houses are just some of the residents’ concerns. The site would be serviced by huge amounts of heavy traffic on roads that are not adequate, and place a drain on local water supply, thereby increasing consumption to feed the chickens and comply with sanitation regulations each year.

Whilst there are many British living close by, this will affect all of the municipality regardless of origin or nationality. Wherever residents living in Partaloa come from, they moved here because they love Spain, and wish to be part of the Spanish community and lifestyle, and to enjoy living in a peaceful and happy community.

At the meeting of 80 local residents mentioned above, there was unanimous approval to set up a residents’ association. This has also been recommended by our expert advisors. It is hoped that residents of all nationalities will support this initiative.

The Eastern Partaloa Residents Association (EPRA) has been formed and will initially represent residents of Eastern Partaloa. People in this area would be most adversely affected by the proposed “chicken farm” – but once this situation is resolved it is intended in future that EPRA will be a municipality wide organisation with a suitable name change.

We all want to share in the vibrant and exciting Spanish culture and history, and most of us want to integrate. The proposed “chicken farm” would be a disaster for the whole municipality, and opposition to it is for the benefit of the whole community. EPRA intends to work closely with our Town Hall in defeating this proposal.

A GoFundMe has been set up in order to finance the campaign, to submit objections, and in worst case support our expert advisors in taking court action if needed. Please donate if you can to: ‘Say NO to the proposed chicken farm’.

Thank you. Please follow us on Facebook and if you can help in any way, have the skills to assist, or have any helpful suggestions you can email us on: epra21es@gmail.com

EPRA