Pact designed to give forest “enough resources to become resilient”
Portugal’s agriculture minister, José Manuel Fernandes, said today that he hopes to have a national forest pact – to give Portugal’s forest enough resources to become more resilient – ready by the end of the year.
“We’re working on it. Tomorrow (Thursday) there will be the Council of Ministers with various decisions that I’m not going to anticipate, but it’s already underway, and we want to have this pact by the end of the year”, he told reporters at the end of a visit to burnt areas in the municipalities of Nelas and Penalva do Castelo, in the district of Viseu.
According to the minister, “the aim is for there to be a consensus, a pact, a national strategy, for sufficient financial resources to be put in place and for there to be no other obstacles”.
Fernandes said that he has been preparing this pact (which may have another name) with the Secretary of State for Forests, Rui Ladeira, since May.
When asked if restrictions on planting certain species are being considered, the minister said that on Tuesday he was in an area “that is in the middle of a major fire, has more than 80% of eucalyptus and didn’t burn.
“And why didn’t it burn? Because it is managed. We have to have a mosaic. We have to have various species, then we have to manage the space well”, he said.
The minister added that the national pactwill have to consider “these various factors, these components.
“I hope there will be a great consensus on this objective and that this tragedy will affect our actions”.
He particularly stressed: “we can’t keep saying the same thing repeatedly, and everything stays the same…” (ie nothing changes for the better).
José Manuel Fernandes alluded to difficulties with legislation and landowners, who have to realise “that they can have a profitable forest” as long as it is managed “like a condominium”, with “a distribution of costs and income”.
Meantime, the minister referred to plans underway to finance animal feed required by farmers (who lost all theirs as well as available pasture), and quickly.
His message to anyone disheartened by the devastation of last week was “don’t give up. Agriculture and the forest have a future and we’re going to support everyone by using all the European funds available and the budget to help as quickly as possible”.
Source: LUSA
