Medieval method to end water woes

A group of volunteers and workers excavating an acequia near Pitres, in southern Spain, high up in the Sierra Nevada. Acequias, a network of water channels created by the Moors over 1,000 years ago, are being excavated and brought back to life to adapt to the crises of climate change. — ©2023 The New York Times Company

HIGH in Spain’s southern mountains, 40 or so people armed with pitchforks and spades cleared stones and piles of grass from an earthwork channel built centuries ago and still keeping the slopes green.

“It’s a matter of life,” said Antonio Jesús Rodríguez García, a farmer from the nearby village of Pitres, population 400.