PLASTICS IN SPANISH AGRICULTURE ANALYSIS, STATISTICS AND NEW DEVELOPMENTS

If we divide the total surface area covered by greenhouses, tunnels and mulchings, that is the surface area on which plastic films are being used, by the population of Spain in 1983, the result is 14m² per capita.

This parameter is exceeded by only two other countries: Japan and Israel, the former with 20–21m²/inhabitant and the latter with a slightly lower figure.

However, the aim of the Plasticultura is not the same in these countries.
While both Japan and Israel need to force the production of crops in view of the limited surface available, that is not the case in Spain.

There are two reasons to explain the Spanish position: first, the fact of being one of the main European producers of horticultural crops, as well as one of the main world consumers (twice as much per capita as U.K. or F.R.G.), and second, that the climate in Spain allows the obtention of early crops which can be exported.

II International Symposium on Plastics in Mediterranean Countries

F. Pedro

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1984.154.10