Drought: Portugal will ban permanent olive grove crops – 05/23/2023 – Market

The sky of Beja, in the south of Portugal, announced a storm when the Minister of Agriculture and Food (MAA), Maria do Céu Antunes, arrived at the headquarters of the Development and Infrastructure Company of Alqueva (EDIA) in the early afternoon of this Tuesday. fair (23) to chair the “Sustainable Alqueva” debate.

However, it seems evident that the rain of the last two days will only help to recover some pastures and little else, assure the farmers. Even so, some believe that there will be ponds that will receive some of the water needed to water the cattle in the coming months.

Expectations are not very optimistic. The president of EDIA, José António Salema, used a weather map to demonstrate how the rains of recent days did not represent “significant inflows” for the region’s water reserves. The data already collected by EDIA confirm this: while at a point in the municipality of Beja (Cinco Reis reservoir) atmospheric precipitation was 25 millimeters (ml), at five kilometers 5 ml were recorded and, in Aldeia da Luz (Mourão) , only 1 ml.

The soils of Alentejo, despite the rains that sporadically fall on the region, will remain dry, given the high temperatures that persist, a phenomenon that causes intense evapotranspiration. Maria do Céu Antunes explained in her speech opening the debate the reasons that justified EDIA’s decision to increase the initial irrigation allocations for the areas included within the area benefiting from the Alqueva irrigation perimeter.

The area of ​​influence of Alqueva is in “exceptional meteorological conditions”, where the combination of “high values ​​of evapotranspiration and residual values ​​of precipitation configure the existence of an extremely dry year”, recognizes the EDIA.

In this situation, and in accordance with the Alqueva Annual Water Use Plan published at the beginning of the irrigation campaign, an increase of 30 million cubic meters will be made to the initial irrigation allocations, for the areas included within the area benefited by the perimeter irrigation system in Alqueva.

“We are almost at the end of May and practically since January it has not rained at all. It is natural that there is a greater need for farmers to water their crops”, justified the president of EDIA to the Lusa agency.

What about intensive crops?

Faced with this situation of scarcity, the Minister of Agriculture announced that within days an order will be published that “no longer authorizes permanent crops (olive groves, avocados and red fruits)” in the Alentejo and the Algarve, as long as the cycle of severe drought continues. and extreme. At the same time, less water-consuming crops will be encouraged.

However, Céu Antunes highlighted the importance of intensive crops. “We are not those who consider them an evil”. The minister recalled that this new cultural model came to occupy a territory and a landscape that “were abandoned”, highlighting its importance for “our balance of payments”.

For livestock producers, access to fallow areas will be authorized to guarantee some food for sheep, goats and cattle herds. The minister also added that the Government would support the installation of ponds, to ensure water reserves needed for agriculture and livestock in dryland regions. The president of EDIA acknowledged to Lusa that the areas dedicated to rainfed agriculture in the Alentejo region are the ones that “are cause for concern”, considering that “there is a dramatic situation” in that area.

The Minister of Agriculture also announced the Government’s willingness to approve a new delimitation of the irrigation perimeters, in order to integrate precarious farmers into the Alqueva irrigation system.

The government’s decision to increase the new water tariff in Alqueva by 30%, when at the end of 2022 it was pointing to an increase of 140%, “was only possible after considering the importance of photovoltaic cells”, a project that involves installation, by 2025, of ten solar power plants in the reservoirs that supply water to the pumping systems that feed Alqueva’s irrigation systems.