The Canary Islands aspires to become the film set of Europe, and it is the wave that a macro-complex dedicated to the audiovisual industry and leisure is trying to catch on, projected on 16 hectares (about 22 soccer fields) of rustic land in the vicinity of the Park Born in Corralejo, north of Fuerteventura.
The initiative has finished reactivating the environmental movement of the islands, which has already managed to temporarily paralyze the works of a luxury
resort
in Tenerife, and has aired the discrepancies within the government team of the unstable Island Council.
The plenary session of the Majorera corporation agreed on November 17 to declare the project promoted by Dreamland Studios, a company that intends to invest 76 million euros to build an audiovisual and film production area and an attached recreational area, of island interest.
This declaration was necessary so that this land can be used as it is rustic, and it went ahead after a very surprising vote.
Two of the parties in charge of the local government (PP and Coalición Canaria) voted against, as well as a wayward councilor from Unidas Podemos, but the president of the Cabildo, Sergio Lloret, and his party Assemblies Municipales de Fuerteventura voted in favor, joining the opposition (PSOE, the other councilor of Unidas Podemos and Nueva Canarias) to gather enough support for the project.
He is, by the way, the third president of the institution so far this legislature, after his predecessor, Blas Acosta (PSOE), resigned due to the motion of censure that his party, the Popular Party and the Canary Islands Coalition prepared against him.
Acosta also tried to carry out the declaration of tourist interest for this initiative.
Area in which it is intended to build the Dreamland complex in Corralejo, according to the image collected in the project report.
A good part of civil society in the Canary Islands has reacted against it —in the middle of last week an initiative was launched on Change.org that already has more than 21,000 signatures.
Fuerteventura, which has some 120,000 inhabitants, was declared a Biosphere Reserve in 2009. And Corralejo, one of the island's tourist centers, is known for some dunes that sometimes cover the road that connects the town with the south of the island.
The chosen location is a rustic piece of land with no facilities that is located just four kilometers from the Corralejo Natural Park, which guards the largest dunes in the entire archipelago, and half a kilometer from a Special Protection Area for Birds (ZEPA).
Dreamland's promoters —local businessman José Antonio Newport, with 50% of the capital;
the venture capital fund Alquimia Ventures and the Tenerife-based production company Volcano— maintain that the core of the project is made up of four sets (one of them measuring 6,000 square meters), as well as two warehouses and a multipurpose building.
Newport acquired the land from the Riu hotel family in December 2020 for just 80,000 euros —50 cents per square meter—, according to the deed of sale of the land to which this newspaper has accessed.
The plans also provide for the creation of a 10,500-square-meter "theme park" dedicated to virtual reality, augmented reality, video games and 3D spread over three multi-storey buildings with a capacity for 4,000 people a day, according to included in the feasibility study of the project.
"It is not a theme park as they intend to show," sources from the promoter say in writing.
"That concept does not correspond to the spirit of Dreamland," they assert.
“There will be a merchandising
sales area
, necessary products during the visit, and catering for a mere matter of supplies for staff, visitors and those who occasionally work in the audiovisual center”.
The company estimates the creation between 150 and 200 direct jobs at first, until reaching the final figure of 450.
Infographic recreation provided by the Dreamland project company in Fuerteventura.
The president of the Cabildo defends the "diversification" that the initiative will bring and stresses that the fact that the declaration of insular interest has been approved does not necessarily imply that the project will go ahead under these conditions.
"The project now goes to public information," he explains in a telephone conversation.
“It is time to decide if it is a good project, convenient from the economic point of view.
We have to verify its compatibility with the preservation of the territory and the landscape ”, although he emphasizes in this sense that he has the endorsement of the environmental body of the corporation and that the promoter manages other alternatives to establish the complex.
Criticism of the location
Lloret, president of the Cabildo, knows the opposition of his government partners firsthand.
The person in charge of Nueva Canarias on the island and mayor of Antigua, Matías Peña, criticizes the location.
"The project is interesting, but not there," he says.
The Minister of Tourism, Jessica de León (Popular Party), was one of the votes against during the plenary session.
"Business development does not have to go through any circumstance or at any price," she assures on her behalf over the phone.
“I am the Minister of Tourism.
I sell landscapes, and this initiative will have an unquestionable impact.
This is a risk for Fuerteventura”.
The formation of it will claim that the space is not anthropized, so it will be necessary to add services and roads that will affect the environment.
"Rustic soil cannot be used for everything."
The natural park of Corralejo, in Fuerteventura.M.
Silva (alamy)
The Popular Party agrees —this time— with part of the proposals of the environmental movement, which also emphasizes that "the area is home to dozens of bird species," according to Noelia Sánchez, spokesperson for the Ben Magec-Ecologistas en Acción Ecologist Federation. .
“And at least three endemic subspecies in danger of extinction have been detected”, such as the Canary Islands houbara, the Canary Islands crow and the Egyptian vulture.
“They intend to build an oversized theme park in the middle of nowhere when there are a lot of degraded areas on the island from an urban point of view.
It is another urban hit that will not revert to society or create quality employment.
A Biosphere Reserve must organize its economic and social development in balance with the ecological and cultural values of the space”.
The vote in the Cabildo has highlighted, in turn, the internal difficulties of United We Can on the island.
The vote in favor of counselor Andrés Briansó facilitated approval.
Briansó, however, has been suspended by the formation since the beginning of the legislature.
"We contribute to developmentalism with our treasures, our fauna and flora," explains the general director of Youth of the Government of the Canary Islands and general coordinator of Podemos on the islands, Laura Fuentes.
"Don't tell us that it's in the public interest when what you're going to do is build a shopping center that could be somewhere else."
"The environment has raised blisters," says the promoter, "by certain information that does not conform to the truth."
Dreamland argues that the soil "does not have any conditions or obstacles for this type of industry", and stresses that this is the ideal soil due to its proximity to the highway and because the strict regulations governing the different soils and degrees of environmental protection in Fuerteventura do not leaves a lot of room."
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