Fern Forest campaigner Siim Kuresoo shares insights from a recent field-trip to meet with foresters, local leaders and community members in Portugal – a country that has increasingly experienced severe forest fires.
As European summers get hotter and drier, devastating forest fires are becoming the Portuguese norm, along with dramatic images of fast-moving flames, airplanes trying to quell them, and people fleeing for their lives.
The overriding impression is that this is what we need to expect in the era of climate change. But is there more to this story?
To find out, Anna Muizniece (she/her) and I spent a few days in northern Portugal meeting with experts to find out what’s happening: João Paulo Fidalgo Carvalho (forestry academic and head of Pro Silva Portugal); Miguel Ribeiro (a forestry and restoration officer at NGO Quercus); and Fernando Antunes Amaral (forest fire survivor and activist). We visited impacted areas and talked with people eager to prioritise community safety and resilience.
They taught us much about the history of the problem, including that this is not a naturally occurring problem. The fires are heightened by the eucalyptus plantations that have been expanding for more than half a century, taking over land as rural abandonment grows and agricultural patterns change. Such plantations provide raw material for the mighty pulp and paper industry, and money for landowners struggling to find a purpose for their land.
But the social and environmental costs are enormous
Portugal’s natural tree species form less flammable, more biodiverse and carbon-rich ecosystems able to provide higher long-term economic returns for the landowner, but shifting to continuous cover forestry takes work, and the financial rewards aren’t immediate.
Nonetheless, some municipalities and communities are taking on the hard work and financial burden, despite receiving little of the external support they need, like funding and technical advice. And while the EU is helping by coordinating emergency help to put out fires, it would be cheaper in the long run for EU funds to help prevent the fires from happening in the first place. The Nature Restoration Regulation (NRR) explicitly requires Portugal to support the transition away from eucalyptus and EU funds could initiate a systemic change in land use.
But change will not happen while the pulp industry dominates policy and resource allocation. Funds from the Common Agricultural Policy must not be used to subsidise an industry determined to put production of short-lived products above people's safety.
EU funds must prioritise ambitious National Restoration Plans.
Doing so would support the inspiring people we met on our journey such as José and Joaquim, the former and current mayor of the local municipality of Bragança. Despite being fierce political opponents, they both take huge pride in the region’s forest restoration and share smiles when discussing turning a eucalyptus plantation into an oak forest. O Sr. Sergio, from Talhadas village, who responded to a big fire in 2024 by organising the community to restore natural forests. He doesn’t mind long working days but is increasingly worried about being seen as an enemy by the pulp industry and its powerful friends, and what this means in terms of obstacles to his mission.
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So there is more to the story of Portugal’s fires. The very landscape has become a danger to its inhabitants because of one powerful industry, and because of the perverse use of funds to support this harmful type of forestry. But sadly, this is not just the case in Portugal. Similar stories are occurring across the EU, as revealed by Metodi Sotirov’s recent study Funding resilient forests: Rethinking EU and State subsidies. We still have time to implement the changes he recommends, but do we have the political will?
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