The president of the Diputación de Alicante, Carlos Mazón, has participated, in Valencia, in the "V Conference of presidencies of provincial deputations, councils and island councils" to address the demographic challenge and the phenomenon of depopulation. "In Spain, the first and most important instrument that exists against depopulation are the councils," said Mazón, who has assured that without the provincial institutions "the survival of small towns will be in danger."

At this point, Mazón has broken down some of the measures that the Alicante Provincial Council has implemented to support demographic maintenance in rural areas of the province. After insisting on the importance of promoting the interior of the territory, he has detailed that this year we have granted in aid "100% of the amount of ordinary subsidies for interior municipalities at risk of depopulation."

Likewise, it has insisted on protecting the environment and the landscape, as well as on implementing communications, road connections, rural roads and highways of the provincial road network.

Another of the strategies that Carlos Mazón presented to the audience has been the promotion of rural pharmacies, which are at risk of abandonment in many municipalities, "beyond the closure of health clinics, which are almost always a municipal competence and where the councils we are covering those holes with improper powers that we have to assume ».

Finally, he has specified that, in the face of the closure of many entities and bank offices, "from the Diputación, through Suma, we are opening offices of the tax body in order to facilitate the administrative work of consistories and taxpayers."

Mazón has concluded his parliament with a mention of the Cooperation Fund of the Generalitat Valenciana and explained that the Diputación has not joined it "because we disagree with aspects such as its mandatory nature, which violates local autonomy."

“We have our own fund for small municipalities at risk of depopulation. The 14 million that the Generalitat requires of us, we have converted into 30 million and, compared to the scarce regional distribution system, we have quintupled the investment in the towns with the smallest population, ”the president has sentenced.

In this meeting, sponsored by the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provincial and the Democracy and Local Government Foundation, the presidents of the councils of Alicante, Huesca, Castellón, Barcelona, ​​Ávila, Lugo and Soria have intervened.