December 2020 – Brief Report from ProDunas Marbella:

There can be no doubt but that everything done by the volunteers in our Association has been greatly impacted by Covid-19.

The impact on Dune Conservation is enormous.

• For the initial weeks it appeared that the wild vegetation benefited from the absence of the human beings.
• However, 9 months later we are observing that the aggressive nature of the invasive species is helping them spread massively in all the dune environments of the Ecological Reserve-Dunes de Marbella as well as in the Natural Monument “Dunas de Artola”.
• The financial means at the disposal of the various Administrations are scarce, so an entire dune system is in danger. It could well be invaded again by these invasive species, setting at nought all the efforts we have put in over more than 17 years -more especially during the last 10 years when our active dune recovery program really took off.
• The annual statistics under the different headings that we have submitted to the various Administrations attest to the great commitment of our Association to the dune ecosystems in the Township of Marbella (Province of Malaga).

This has been the day we give virtual hugs and our thanks to ALL of you who have been with us for so many years, doing volunteer work whenever we asked you to!

This atypical year due to Covid-19, the Andalusian Volunteering Board, in collaboration with the Provincial Volunteering Boards and Networks and with the support of the Ministry for Equality, Social Policies and Conciliation of the JUNTA DE ANDALUCÍA is working to establish the current situation volunteer organisations are in because of the impact of COVID-19.

For this reason, they have got in contact with ProDunas, asking us to reply to a questionnaire they have launched entitled:

THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON VOLUNTEER BODIES.

Since 2008 our Association has been part of this Andalusian Volunteering organisation. Every year we take part, supplying reliable statistics on our work and on the involvement of the volunteers and, of course, the children from the schools in Marbella and from farther afield, outside the province of Malaga.

Conservation in the different dune ecosystems is a very big responsibility, although at first glance it may seem like an easy task. The impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic is wreaking havoc on both wild and native vegetation. This is because of the lack of wo/man-hours for conservation work for the removal of washed up debris, and for the rapid grubbing out of the invasive vegetation which now has a chance to flourish.

The Volunteering Board has thanked us for the contribution of our statistics for the years 2018 – 2019 and for 2020 – which has still to be completed – as it shows the real severity that results as mobility restrictions and lack of participation by large groups of volunteers begin to hit.

At the end of the year the statistics for 2020 will become available and may be compared with previous years: https://produnas.org/en/statistics