La actuación del Instituto Nacional de Colonización en el municipio de Hellín (Albacete)

During the mid-50’s in the present century, the State declares the Irrigation Canal of Hellin, in the province of Albacete, of high national interest for agricultural colonization. A grant of flows of 1.000 l/s from the river Mundo, as well as from the extraction of hypogeum waters, was awarded for the starting of irrigation. This way, they intended to palliate the economic crisis that the Hellin municipality was going through, as a result of the collapse of the traditional textile industry related to the exploitation of esparto. From that moment onwards an important transformation of the space starts through the distribution of 1.755 hectares among some two hundred farmers, who group themselves in three new-built rural towns, namely: Nava de Campana, Mingogil and Canada de Agra. The development and details of this colonizing task are dealt with in this monographic study.