Country to use €8B-€9B of EU recovery funds to combat climate change

Portugal’s minister for the environment and climate action said on Thursday that “between eight and nine billion euros from EU funds” of the total that Portugal will receive from the European Union as part of the effort to recover from the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic is to be dedicated to fighting climate change.

“The volume of money that will come to Portugal, between thirty and thirty-five percent, is by obligation dedicated to the fight against climate change,” said the minister, João Pedro Matos Fernandes. “In saying this, I am not anticipating anything that the government will not present in the near future, but eight to nine billion euros will have to be dedicated to the fight against climate change.”

Matos Fernandes was speaking at the opening of the second day of the Portugal Mobi Summit conference, which is to run in online format from Cascais, near Lisbon, until Friday, under the theme ‘Mobility in a Changing World’.

In the EU budget framework that ends this year, the minister said, support for Portugal was €2.3 billion.

“The difference is this: it is the triple in the same period of time,” he said. “Of course, mobility will be responsible for a very expressive slice of this investment.”

In September, speaking in an online conference on ‘New Sustainability Dilemmas’, the minister argued that the EU, to be consistent with its Green New Deal, should use 30% to 35% of Europe’s recovery effort in the fight against climate change. He stressed the importance of using this moment to invest in a new economy, in Portugal and in the EU as a whole.