Spotlight 3 – December, 2020

The new European Commission headed by President Ursula Von Der Leyen, which took office in 2019, identified environmental sustainability in the European Union as one of its priorities, leading to the announcement of a European Green Deal. The pandemic has not changed this objective, as a significant part of the recovery and resilience package to combat the economic impact of COVID-19, will be dedicated to the green recovery.

In Portugal, since the seventies successive Governments have been developing specific legislation for environmental protection, beginning with the Nature Conservation Act in 1970. Despite significant progress since then, Portugal currently registers less favourable environmental indicators than most Member States of the European Union, except for indicators related to renewable energy.

In this report, we analyse the sustainability record in Portugal, we define the challenges and sectoral opportunities and what should be the priorities of green investments in the coming years, to reduce the gap relative to the European average.

With the Support of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation