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Environmental Association Defends Moratorium on Sale of Herdade da Comporta

24 July 2018

The ZERO Association today argued for a moratorium on the sale of Herdade da Comporta, until the completion of the Management Plan for the Comporta-Galé Site, and the inclusion of that property into the public domain with eventual integration into the Companhia das Lezírias.

“ZERO believes that the state should impose a moratorium on the sale until the conclusion of the Institute of Conservation of Nature and Forests’ (ICNF) responsibility plan, which has been in preparation for many years,” the environmental association said in a statement released today.

“ZERO also fears that the Portuguese State will lose the opportunity to do justice and defend the rights of its taxpayers who were heavily penalized during the banking crisis, by ensuring that the immense area is included in the public domain, taking advantage of the fact that the largest creditor of the Special Closed Fund for Real Estate Investment (FEIIF), which manages Herdade da Comporta’s real estate assets, is the Caixa Geral de Depósitos,” ZERO said in its statement.

Noting that a general assembly of the participants in the fund that runs Herdade da Comporta is scheduled to take place on July 27 to discuss offers for the purchase of the farm on the Alentejo coast, environmentalists at the ZERO Association questioned the need for a “hurried sale” of the property, as “the preparation of the Comporta-Galé Site Management Plan, which is mandatory within the scope of national and European legislation for an area classified in terms of nature conservation as part of the Natura Network 2000, is still in progress.”

For the ZERO Association, the integration of the estate into the public domain is the only option that would guarantee the possibility of a “reassessment of the choices made over the last years regarding land development on the Alentejo coast, in particular by the creation of Tourism Development Areas (ADT) which fail to safeguard protected natural environments.”

“The sales criteria should not be exclusively financial, and the possibility should be strongly considered of using the area in question for projects that favour a more sustainable development of the territory that is in greater harmony with the preservation of the natural, scenic and even cultural values ​​of the area of Comporta, while avoiding a repeat of the high impact and occupancy tourist/real estate occupation similar to the one predicted for the Alentejo Coast between Tróia and Sines, which unfortunately continues to be expected, and which was only delayed due to the economic crisis of the beginning of the decade,” the document added.

Inclusion in the Companhia das Lezírias

The environmentalists at ZERO also believe that “the entire estate of Herdade da Comporta (Herdade da Comporta FEIIF, the real estate investment fund that manages tourism and real estate projects in that area, and Herdade da Comporta – Agrosilvícolas e Turística, which manages agricultural and forestry activities) should be reintegrated into the Companhia das Lezírias.

“It is important to point out,” says ZERO, “that the Lezírias Company is an example of public management, since all of the company’s activity are executing using its revenues, receiving no contributions from the State Budget, with very positive management results and long-recognized work in favor of sustainability,” said the ZERO Association’s environmentalists stated, noting that Herdade da Comporta was once already a part of the then Companhia das Lezírias do Tejo and Sado and was later sold to the British The Atlantic Company, Ltd., in 1925, and further sold to the Espírito Santo family in 1955.

The ZERO environmental association was created at the end of 2015 based on the common interest of about one hundred people for the achievement of sustainable development in Portugal. ZERO is chaired by Francisco Ferreira, Professor in the field of the environment at the Faculty of Science and Technology of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa (FCT-UNL).

Original Story: Diário Imobiliário

Translation: Richard Turner