While the smoke from the fires captures public attention every year, another silent threat advances over the Paraná Delta: the embankments.
These embankments fragment the wetlands and nullify their capacity as water regulators.
This is revealed by the latest report from the Wetlands Foundation (Wetlands International), which indicates that 14.04% of the surface of the lower delta is fragmented by these structures.
There are 8,938 kilometers of embankments, which “is equivalent to traveling Route 40 back and forth or traveling from Ushuaia to La Quiaca twice,” the study illustrates.
Moreover, according to the survey, the embankments in the Delta have grown by 5% in recent years.
They have been driven by agriculture, intensive livestock farming, and real estate developments that irreversibly modify the ecosystem.
The “real estate boom” that affects the diversity of the wetlands
Since 2020, a “third wave” of gated communities has been observed in the Paraná Delta, driven by the COVID-19 pandemic.
This generated a real estate boom in wetland areas, where people move to live to be close to nature, but without considering the environmental impacts.
The 2025 mapping by the Wetlands Foundation surveyed a total area of 34,618 km², of which 56% corresponds to the Paraná Delta and the rest to tributary basins in Buenos Aires.
2,582 km² of embankments were identified in Entre Ríos and Buenos Aires, an area equivalent to almost 13 times the size of the City of Buenos Aires.
The embankments are closed embankments that surround productive areas and include systems of ditches, canals, and gates to regulate water.
“These infrastructures affect the connectivity of ecosystems and reduce their water regulation capacity, increasing the risk of flooding,” warns the report.
The study documented 596 gated communities in 2024, with 47 new developments compared to the 2018 mapping.
It’s not just the Paraná Delta: embankments and gated communities go beyond
The urbanizations reach 268.69 km² in the Buenos Aires tributaries and 171.76 km² in the Paraná Delta.
In particular, the Luján River Basin shows the greatest impact: 26.8% of its floodplain has been transformed into gated communities.
Additionally, for the first time, the survey identified “horizontal property condominiums”.
These are complexes of complete buildings with pools and internal roads that generate higher water consumption and waste.
“The wetlands of the Paraná Delta are undergoing a rapid transformation that compromises their ecological functioning,” states the report by the Wetlands Foundation.
The Colony Park case in San Isidro exemplifies the irreversible damage: although the judiciary halted the development in 2010, the land filling was already completed.
In Rosario, another case is the Legado Deliot, which resulted in a sentence of $486,000 for deprivation of property use and $66,840,000 for environmental removal.
The environmental and social impacts of the fragmentation of the Paraná Delta
“The real destruction of the Paraná Delta is the embankments. Much more than the fires,” said environmental lawyer Fabián Maggi to La Capital.
The embankments in the Delta cause the loss of critical ecosystem functions:
- Regulate floods and buffer rises
- Provide water available for purification
- Maintain the biodiversity of the ecosystem
- Sustain the activities of local inhabitants
“For it to continue functioning as such, we need water to be present,” explained Graciela Klekailo, director of the Environmental Observatory of the National University of Rosario, to La Capital.
And she added: “With an embankment, the natural flow of water is interrupted“.
Furthermore, Conicet researcher Natalia Morandeira pointed out to La Capital that “in many cases, the embankments are made without regulation or planning, leading to biodiversity loss”.
