€110 MILLION FOR EXTRACTION OR REGENERATION: WHAT FUTURE IS PORTUGAL CHOOSING FOR THE BARROSO AND THE PORTUGUESE PEOPLE?

Isabel Marcos

Oct 8

12 min read

Article by Isabel Marcos

© Photo by USGS on Unsplash

What if the public investment allocated to the mine were invested in regenerating the territory?

The Portuguese State has decided to allocate up to €110 million in non-repayable public support to Savannah’s Barroso mining project. The company itself presents this contribution as a substantial reduction in the capital it will have to raise to establish the mining operation. Faced with this choice, we must ask a question that precedes all promises of growth: what would happen if the same public investment were granted to communities, cooperatives and local businesses so that they could regenerate the Barroso?

I am not proposing that the State distribute the money indiscriminately, nor that it replace one large extractive project with a collection of unrelated small projects. I propose that the €110 million finance an integrated territorial system capable of creating housing, employment, food, energy autonomy, water security, fire prevention and the regeneration of soils and biodiversity. This proposal arises from my research in the ecosemiotics of regenerative design. A territory is not an empty surface on which objects are installed. It is a system of relationships among human and non-human beings, water, soil, climate, plants, animals, buildings, techniques, memories, values and forms of governance. Regeneration does not simply mean reducing harm. It means increasing the system’s capacity to produce life, autonomy and meaning over time.

THE BARROSO IS ALREADY A PRODUCTIVE SYSTEM

The Barroso does not begin with the mine and does not need it in order to acquire value. It is an agro-sylvo-pastoral system built over centuries through villages, common lands known as baldios, lameiros, forests, watercourses, mountain crops and extensive livestock farming. In 2018, the FAO recognised it as a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System. Livestock farming, pastures, native breeds, beekeeping, potato and rye production, communal land management and traditional water systems constitute a living heritage that continues to produce food, biodiversity, landscape and knowledge. Boticas and Montalegre had a combined population of approximately 14,261 in the 2021 Census. The €110 million corresponds to approximately €7,700 per inhabitant, or €7.86 million per year over the 14 years planned for the mining operation. This does not mean giving that sum to each resident. These figures help us understand the scale of the opportunity: for 14 years, the State could finance a genuine regenerative transformation of the Barroso.

REGENERATION MEANS ARTICULATING THREE STRATA

The programme I propose is organised through three inseparable strata. The first comprises the vital conditions: water, soil, food, biodiversity, energy, health and microclimate. Without them, there is neither an economy nor a community. They are not passive “resources” placed at the disposal of production; they are the living systems on which production depends.

The second comprises the built assets: houses, cisterns, levadas, energy networks, water and sewage treatment systems, vegetable gardens, workshops, paths, common spaces, processing and distribution facilities, cooperatives and services. These assets must support vital cycles rather than interrupt them.

The third comprises the objects of cult, in the semiotic sense: the values, rules, authorities and goods that a society decides to protect and transmit. What we revere guides what we build. If the supreme value is immediate financial profitability, the territory will be organised to extract and export. If the values are water, life, care, autonomy and the continuity of communities, institutions and investments will have to assume a different form.

Regeneration arises from the articulation of these strata: values guide, organisation sustains and built systems regenerate. The €110 million should therefore not be divided among isolated sectors, but invested in five interdependent territorial cycles: value and governance; food and biodiversity; dwelling and microclimate; water; and energy.

THE REGENERATIVE BARROSO PROGRAMME

1. VALUE AND GOVERNANCE CYCLE — €15 MILLION

Before building houses or financing businesses, it is necessary to decide who owns the assets, who makes the decisions, how money circulates and where the surpluses remain. A Regenerative Barroso Cooperative Fund would be created, governed by representatives of the baldios, farmers, shepherds, inhabitants, cooperatives, municipalities, young people, scientific institutions and environmental organisations. Its mission would be to finance activities that simultaneously increase the territory’s economic autonomy and ecological capacity. Five million euros would fund, for 14 years, the technical team, the School of Regeneration, assistance for applicants, territorial mapping, ecological accounting, monitoring and independent evaluation. The other €10 million would constitute a revolving fund for interest-free or low-interest loans. As the loans were repaid, the money would return to the territory to support new projects. Fundamental infrastructure — land acquired with public money, collective water systems, workshops, processing facilities, cooperative housing and energy networks — would be placed in a protected territorial ownership body. It could be used by businesses and cooperatives, but could not be sold to pay business debts or appropriated by individuals. The common heritage would thus be separated from the risk associated with each economic activity. Applications would be assessed against economic, ecological and social criteria: durable employment; local purchasing; reduction of external dependency; improvement of soil and water; cooperation between activities; permanence of assets; transmission of knowledge; and the return of surpluses to territorial regeneration.

2. FOOD AND BIODIVERSITY CYCLE — €30 MILLION

Food would begin in living soil, not in the supermarket. This cycle would connect agriculture, livestock farming, forestry, fire prevention, food processing, distribution and composting.

Herds that produce food and protect the territory

An allocation of €15 million would finance herds of goats and sheep, cattle of native breeds and, where ecologically appropriate, donkeys. The territory would be divided into grazing units defined according to fire risk, soil capacity, habitats, food reserves, water points and communal uses. Support would cover the establishment of new shepherds, the acquisition and breeding of animals, mobile fencing, shelters, water points, veterinary support, georeferencing and payment for the biomass-management service. Expansion would be gradual and subordinate to the carrying capacity of each area. This solution already has a basis in reality. In Boticas, a “fire-prevention goats” project brought together ten shepherds, approximately 1,500 sheep and goats and an intervention area of around 100 hectares. The national support programme for extensive grazing also recognises the public service provided by animals in reducing fuel load. But the cycle would not end with vegetation clearance. The herds would produce meat, milk, wool and manure. The manure would feed the composting process; the compost would regenerate the soils; the soils would produce pasture and food; and cooperative units would process and market the products. Fire prevention would cease to be an occasional expense and become part of a territorial economy.

Regenerative agriculture and food cooperatives

Five million euros would support the establishment of 100 young farmers, with an indicative allocation of €50,000 per project. A further €5 million would support 100 existing farms in restoring lameiros and terraces, increasing organic matter, composting, rotating crops, retaining water, establishing biodiverse hedgerows, nurseries and seed banks, developing beekeeping and adapting to climate change. The final €5 million would create small- and medium-scale cooperative units to process milk and cheese, meat, wool, honey, plants, mushrooms, chestnuts, potatoes, rye and other local products. A cooperative shop and platform would connect producers, inhabitants, canteens, restaurants and visitors. Organic waste would return to the cycle as compost or biogas. The objective would not be to produce ever more, but to produce better, retain value within the territory and ensure that economic activity increases fertility, biodiversity and food autonomy.

3. DWELLING AND MICROCLIMATE CYCLE — €25 MILLION

Attracting young people without providing housing, employment and services is merely a communication campaign. The Barroso has empty houses and villages with capacity to welcome new inhabitants, but many homes need to be restored and adapted to climatic conditions and contemporary needs. Fifteen million euros would finance the restoration of approximately 100 homes and the creation of small cooperative housing clusters. These would not be conventional houses to which a few “green” devices had been added. They would be regenerative systems of dwelling, designed by reading the climate, water, soil, solar orientation, winds, topography, biodiversity and available materials. The interventions would recover the bioclimatic principles found in vernacular architecture: proximity between buildings, protection from the wind, walls with thermal mass, openings dimensioned according to orientation, shutters, courtyards, intermediate spaces, well-insulated roofs and low-toxicity local materials. The priority would be to reduce needs before installing technology. According to its scale and the applicable legislation, each house would integrate:

collection of water from roofs and first-flush diversion;
a cistern dimensioned according to rainfall and consumption;
separate networks for drinking water, rainwater and greywater;
low-consumption equipment;
greywater treatment through planted filters or small wetlands;
safe reuse for subsurface irrigation;
compliant blackwater treatment through individual or collective systems suited to the density;
composting of organic waste;
solar generation on roofs and pergolas, without occupying living soil;
shared energy storage and management;
a vegetable garden, orchard, shade trees and permeable surfaces.

The house would cease to be an isolated object connected to networks that remove water, energy and materials and expel invisible waste. It would become a node in a territorial metabolism: it captures, stores, uses, treats and returns water; receives and produces energy; transforms waste into fertile matter; creates a microclimate; protects inhabitants; and participates in food production. Five million euros would finance common spaces — kitchens, laundries, workshops, work rooms, nurseries, guest houses, health and care facilities — so that each family would not have to purchase individually everything that can be shared. The remaining €5 million would support local businesses involved in construction, heritage restoration, carpentry, stonework, insulation, water and energy systems and the production of materials. Housing regeneration would become a practical school and a source of skilled employment. The supported homes would remain in an affordable cooperative rental pool or be subject to long-term permanent-residence clauses. Public investment could not finance properties subsequently diverted towards speculation or seasonal accommodation.

4. WATER CYCLE — €20 MILLION

Water would not be treated merely as a piped service. The cycle would begin with rain and the landscape, continue through the soil, springs, lameiros (traditional irrigated meadows), houses and productive activities, and end with water being returned to the territory in a condition capable of nourishing life again. The first step would be to map springs, watercourses, infiltration zones, aquifers, lameiros (traditional irrigated meadows), traditional irrigation systems, erosion areas, contamination points and consumption. This reading would determine where to build, cultivate, graze, infiltrate, store and protect. The investment would restore levadas (gravity-fed irrigation channels), small weirs, ponds, wetlands, riverbanks, hedgerows and riparian woodlands. It would create retention and infiltration basins, water pathways and systems for slowing runoff, simultaneously preventing erosion, dryness and flash flooding. Separate networks would be installed in villages wherever technically possible. Rainwater would be stored or infiltrated; greywater would be treated and reused; blackwater would receive compliant decentralised or collective treatment. Systems would be chosen according to density, topography, soil and maintenance capacity — not according to the appeal of any single technology. A territorial monitoring network would make water levels, flow rates and quality indicators public. Farmers, baldios (common lands) and villages could be remunerated according to results in infiltration, spring protection, improved soil cover and the restoration of aquatic ecosystems. The water cycle would connect all the others: it supplies homes, sustains herds, produces food, regulates the microclimate, reduces fire risk and maintains biodiversity.

5. ENERGY AND LOCAL ACTIVITIES CYCLE — €20 MILLION

Energy would begin with reducing needs: bioclimatic homes, insulation, efficient equipment, proximity between housing and work, and resource sharing. Production would only come afterwards. Eight million euros would finance energy communities installed on roofs, farms, public facilities, pergolas and other surfaces that have already been artificialised. Electricity would supply homes, workshops, water systems, food refrigeration, agricultural processing and shared mobility. Storage and load management would make it possible to use energy primarily when it is produced. Twelve million euros would support approximately 100 local businesses, cooperatives and activities, with average grants adjusted to their scale and their own investment. Eligible activities would include repair workshops, food processing, regenerative construction, forestry, nurseries, healthcare, support for older people, culture, crafts, research, nature tourism, digital services and cooperative logistics. Activities would be selected according to how they connect with the other cycles. A workshop repairs agricultural equipment; a carpentry business uses locally managed timber; a kitchen processes regional products; a water company maintains cisterns and filters; an energy cooperative reduces farm costs; a nursery supplies trees to restore soils and watercourses. Value would thus cease to pass through the territory in only one direction. It would circulate among activities that sustain one another.

Proposed €110 million budget for Regenerative Barroso: value and governance €15m; food and biodiversity €30m; dwelling and microclimate €25m; water €20m; energy and local activities €20m. Source: Isabel Marcos.

Proposed budget for the five territorial cycles of Regenerative Barroso. Source: Isabel Marcos.

This distribution should not be understood as definitive. A diagnosis carried out with the communities could transfer funds between cycles. What could not be altered would be the principle of integration: no building without a water cycle; no production without soil regeneration; no energy at the expense of ecosystems; no business without a territorial return; and no public investment without clear ownership, rules and evaluation.

A FOUR-PHASE PROCESS

Phase 1 — Reading the territory: first year

The programme would begin with an ecosemiotic reading: water, soil, climate, biodiversity, forms of dwelling, existing activities, empty buildings, knowledge, conflicts, values and aspirations. Physical and social maps and a baseline accounting system would be created, without which regeneration cannot be measured. At the same time, the Cooperative Fund, the territorial ownership body and the governance assembly would be established.

Phase 2 — Experimenting: second and third years

Two or three pilot villages would be selected, not to concentrate all the investment, but to test the articulation of the cycles: regenerative homes, biomass-management herds, water systems, an energy community, food production and processing, and common spaces. The results would make it possible to correct costs, techniques and rules before expansion.

Phase 3 — Connecting and expanding: fourth to seventh years

Effective experiments would be adapted to other villages. Cooperative processing and distribution units would connect producers from different places. The School of Regeneration would train inhabitants and new residents and transform the Barroso into a territory of learning.

Phase 4 — Consolidating and transmitting: eighth to fourteenth years

Funding would progressively shift from establishment to consolidation. Businesses and cooperatives would be expected to generate their own incomes; the revolving fund would finance new cycles; knowledge would be documented and transmitted; and evaluation would determine which activities were capable of continuing beyond the initial investment.

HOW WOULD WE KNOW WHETHER REGENERATION WAS OCCURRING?

Success would not be measured solely by the amount spent, the number of applications or turnover. The indicators would have to extend across all three strata.

Within the vital conditions, measurements would include water retained in the soil, spring-water quality, organic matter, erosion, fuel biomass, species diversity, the area of managed pasture and food production without ecological impoverishment.

Within the built assets, measurements would include homes restored, reductions in energy needs, water captured and reused, wastewater treated, energy shared, workshops and cooperative units in operation, and the accessibility of services.

Within values and forms of governance, assessment would cover participation in decision-making, transparency, the permanence of common ownership, the proportion of local purchasing, the return of surpluses to the territory, the arrival of young people, the number of permanent residents and the capacity of communities to resolve their problems collectively.

A project would only be regenerative if it improved all three levels simultaneously. Creating jobs by destroying water would not be regeneration. Installing technology without community governance would not be regeneration. Protecting nature by expelling inhabitants would not be regeneration either.

PREVENTING A NEW CAPTURE OF THE TERRITORY

The €110 million could be appropriated by University Laboratories / regenerative cooperatives, reproducing under a different language precisely what the programme seeks to overcome. It would therefore require firm rules:

full publication of funding, contracts, beneficial owners and evaluations;
declaration and oversight of conflicts of interest;
juries including community representatives and independent technical evaluation;
limits per beneficiary and preference for cooperatives, micro-enterprises and local consortia;
clauses preventing the speculative sale of financed assets;
separation between the common heritage and the risks of the businesses using it;
an obligation to repay support when assets are relocated or used for other purposes;
annual economic, ecological, spatial and social evaluation;
public review of decisions whenever results do not correspond to the objectives;
retention of the revolving fund within the territory for future generations.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EXTRACTION AND REGENERATION

An extractive economy asks how much value it can remove from a territory within a given period. A regenerative economy asks how each investment can increase the territory’s capacity to continue producing life and autonomy. The €110 million would not create a single large business. It would create relationships among houses, water, energy, shepherds, farmers, forests, workshops, cooperatives, care, research and culture. Captured water would supply homes and gardens; treated wastewater would return safely to the cycle; organic waste would produce compost and energy; herds would reduce biomass and provide food; cooperatives would process products; local energy would power water systems, refrigeration and workshops; the economy would pay for maintenance; and governance would protect the commons. This is what it means to design a territory as a living system: the cycles nourish one another. There is no guarantee that every business would survive or that the investment would resolve, within 14 years, problems accumulated over decades. Yet even when an activity failed, a restored house, more fertile soil, a protected spring, a treatment system, a cooperative, an acquired skill or a more resilient forest would remain in the Barroso.

If the Portuguese State considers it legitimate to grant up to €110 million in non-repayable public support to a mining company, it must explain why it does not offer the Barroso an equivalent opportunity to develop its own future. The choice is not between the mine and abandonment. It is between continuing to finance extraction and the destruction of natural and environmental heritage, or beginning to invest in regeneration and the quality of life of Portuguese people. Between removing value for a few years and building autonomy for generations. Between treating the Barroso as an ore deposit and recognising it for what it really is: a living system capable of producing a future for the Barroso and for Portuguese people.