by Pedro Pousão-Ferreira, President of the Board, S2AQUAcoLAB, Portugal.
Portugal is one of the European countries with the highest per capita consumption of fish and seafood, at an average of close to 60 kg per person per year. Representing an annual national consumption of over 600,000 tonnes. However, national aquaculture and fishing production only supplies around 200,000 tonnes, meaning that the country needs to import the amount of fish that is lacking from other parts of the world. This structural imbalance raises questions about food security, environmental sustainability, economic resilience and strategic planning. Despite its long Atlantic coastline, favourable climate, technical expertise and a strong seafood culture, Portugal continues to underperform in terms of aquaculture development.
Aquaculture as a Strategic Pillar for Food Security
Aquaculture is a strategic activity that produces food, contributing for decarbonisation and strengthens national food supply, while reducing pressure on wild stocks. In 2023, Portuguese aquaculture production reached 20,873 tonnes, making a 9.8 percent increase compared to the previous year. While this growth reflects positively in the sector’s resilience and innovation ability, it remains marginal relative to national consumption, representing only around 3 percent of the annual national fish consumption. The industry is sustained by a small number of companies that operate on excellent technical and environmental standard that are often internationally recognised.
The question is not whether Portugal can grow its aquaculture sector but why has not done so yet.
The Bottleneck of Land Use Constraints
One of the main structural constraints to the development of aquaculture in Portugal is the lack of licencing available for onshore production systems, including semi-intensive systems, hatcheries, nurseries and RAS. This end up impacting the sector’s capacity to support offshore farming, diversify species and increase production.
Repeatedly over the years, proposals have been made to apply abandoned coastal areas, including former salt pans and degraded coastal zones, for aquaculture development. These areas were already altered by human activity, being environmentally suitable and strategically located yet are still largely unavailable due to regulatory inertia and fragmented territorial planning. This would allow the production of other food sources that are minimally or not dependent on freshwater, such as algae, bivalves and marine fish.
Water Scarcity, Climate Change and Policy Contradictions
Portugal is becoming increasingly vulnerable to prolonged droughts, heatwaves and extreme rainfall, resulting in water loss rather than storage. Without proper planning, freshwater availability is no longer sufficient to support the population, tourism, agriculture and food production. Yet solutions that could reduce dependency on freshwater, such as marine aquaculture, are not receiving much attention.
Urban development continues to prioritise impermeable surfaces, while activities such as agriculture and aquaculture, which often contribute significantly to water retention and carbon sequestration, are restricted.
In 2024, an extreme drought in the Algarve region resulted in cuts to the supply of freshwater for all non-essential uses. Farmers were only able to keep their crops alive but were unable to meet production targets. This resulted in economic losses for the agricultural sector. In such extreme events, which are increasingly being exacerbated by climate change, aquaculture can be a viable option for food production as it mainly depends on saltwater, an abundant resource in Portugal.
Although legislative efforts have been made to simplify and improve licensing processes in Portugal, these measures often end up discouraging investors, as end up leading to reduction of available area and revocation of existing licences.
Setting Targets for Aquaculture
Portugal urgently needs clear, measurable and time-bound targets for the development of this aquaculture sector. For example:
- Increasing national production by 120,000 to 180,000 tonnes over the next five, ten or 15 years, which would take us from producing only 3 percent of our annual fish consumption to producing at least 20 percent;
- Defining priority species, production systems and suitable locations;
- Allocating specific onshore and offshore areas;
- Ensuring regulatory certainty and predictable licensing timelines.
The lack of defined objectives make strategic planning is impossible. Leading to an accumulation of reports, coloured charts and policy documents that do not generate meaningful change.
Meanwhile, Portugal keeps exhausting its natural resource budget earlier each year, highlighting the urgent need to produce more food, in a sustainable and responsible way.
A Sector Ready to Grow
Portuguese aquaculture has already proven its ability to operate to high environmental and technical standards, innovate and even compete internationally, especially regarding the quality of its product. What it lacks are space, policy coherence and political courage.
If aquaculture is essential for feeding the population, it must be recognised as a public interest activity. It is neither sustainable to continue exporting the environmental burden of food production to other countries, only to import it back with an added carbon footprint.
Portugal must either adopt an integrated, forward-looking approach to food production, water management and territorial planning or it will continue to depend on others for something as fundamental as feeding its population.
