Portugal’s minister of agriculture and food, Maria do Céu Antunes, is convinced that there will be no shortage of water for Portuguese agriculture this year, and that it is not necessary to take more drastic measures for the time being, writes Lusa. “What we hope is that this does not happen,” assured Ms Antunes in response to a question put to her by farmers’ associations on the possibility of lack of water later this summer. The government has ‘contingency measures’ for the driest areas in the Algarve, she said, including the use of council boreholes to “guarantee permanent crops”.
