Portugal

Saturday 13th April 2024.   Prologue: We had been vaccinated, twice in fact. When we all came down with Covid-19 at the same time, I had the growing sensation that something had gone very wrong. Either it was the vaccine from the small hospital in Monchique that gave me the shot, or we’d caught it at the EB23 Manuel de Nascimento school in Monchique, where the BRIDGE club met. The auditorium had probably not been disinfected and there we were, trapped: two dozen decision-makers from various associations, companies and institutions, as well as politicians. That was in mid-May 2022 and …

Saturday 23rd March 2024. Market gardening – the worldwide trend of small-scale farming based on the use of organic and regenerative farming techniques has arrived in the Algarve. More and more farms are offering their produce at farmers’ markets from Lagos to Tavira; some even deliver a weekly vegetable box to your doorstep. If you haven’t come across the term “market gardening” yet, in a nutshell, it’s all about small-scale intensive farms and smallholdings that grow a diversity of vegetable and fruit crops and sell their produce directly to consumers through local farmers’ markets and on-farm stalls, or local grocery …

Saturday 9th March 2024. Using the forest as a resource for doing business – with eucalyptus monocultures – is something that always works in favour of the Navigator Company. Even after a forest fire, woodland owners can still send the scorched trunks of their eucalyptus trees to the cellulose factory. The wood is lighter in that case: the Navigator Company takes the wood, pays a lower price and can still use it to produce paper. No problem at all. “Raising funds” has always been important for the Navigator Company: their cash flow has to be carefully managed. So, ten years …

Saturday 2nd March 2024. Can you smell the money? My first forest fire arrived without any declaration of war, yet we are now engaged in a battle that has been going on for a lot longer than the war in Ukraine. It’s a climate war, which started on 11 September 2003 with a fire that blazed its way through Monchique to Silves and then came back, via Aljezur, right into the heart of the Odemira municipality, destroying over 40,000 hectares of forest before finally being extinguished only a week later. 400 km² multiplied by 20,000 tons of CO2 per km²! …

Saturday 10th February 2024. Portugal has 308 municipalities. One of these is Torres Vedras. Located 54 km north-west of Lisbon, it covers an area of 407 km². The medium-sized city, which is home to 83,072 people (2021 census) and spreads across 13 parishes, is governed by the Socialist Party and its mayor Laura Maria Jesus Rodrigues. Last week, on 31 January, the municipality’s Climate Action Plan was presented to the public at a well-attended event in the auditorium of the Environmental Education Centre. The city’s inhabitants now have the opportunity to comment on it publicly from 2 to 15 February. …

Saturday 3rd February 2024. The small publishing house “Haupt”, based in Bern, Switzerland, has published an interesting and important book. Telling the story of the spice trade over 5,000 years, it was written by Norwegian journalist Thomas Reinertsen Berg and translated from Norwegian into German. Why isn’t this book also available in Portuguese and English translations? And why does a Norwegian have to write a book about the history of spices when Portugal played such an important role in their trade, alongside the Netherlands, England, China, India, Vietnam, Indonesia and Sri Lanka? Wouldn’t this also have been a suitable topic …

Saturday 27th January 2024. Now, here for once we have not just talk – things are actually delivered. Last Monday, the new museum of Vila do Bispo was inaugurated by Mayor Rute Silva in the presence of the president of the Algarvian CCDR (Coordination and Development Commission) José Apolinário. The new Museum Vila do Bispo is called O Celeiro da História – The Barn of History – and is the result of the restoration of the former Celeiros de Vila do Bispo – EPAC. The formerly dilapidated building has been transformed into a public cultural centre. A public centre of …

Saturday 20th January 2023. Monchique, Portugal. According to the latest most recent census of 2021 there are still 5,462 residents living here. We’ve seen better times, when Monchique still boasted 14,779 residents. That was in 1960. At the time everybody was in work, meaningful, worthwhile work. This dictatorship thing wasn’t great, true, but at least you had your stock of medronho at home. Right? Exercising his profession, a shoemaker would earn what he needed to live. A farmer had his shoes made to measure at home by travelling shoemakers from Monchique. Monchique provided the potatoes, the bacon and the sweetcorn …

Saturday, 23rd December 2023. Many of us view driving – so comfortable, isn’t it? – as a liberation from arduous walking. As for me, I’ve been fighting for years against the noise levels of the Algarve Autodrome, where at this time of day test drives are once more taking place in preparation of some car race or other. It’s the combustion engine that transforms petrol into smelly exhaust fumes, deafening to boot when the southwesterly blows from the Atlantic, bringing with it the never-ending noise. These days, quiet, clean and environmentally-friendly alternatives are available in motoring. There just needs to …

Saturday 16th december 2023. Many of us view driving – so comfortable, isn’t it? – as a liberation from arduous walking. As for me, I’ve been fighting for years against the noise levels of the Algarve Autodrome, where at this time of day  test drives are once more taking place in preparation of some car race or other. It’s the combustion engine that transforms petrol into smelly exhaust fumes, deafening to boot when the south-westerly blows across from the Atlantic, by bringing with it the never-ending noise. These days, quiet, clean and environmentally-friendly alternatives are available in motoring. There just …