Six environmental associations delivered, to the Administrative and Fiscal Court of Loulé, an action for judicial challenge of the Environmental Impact Statement (DIA) "conditional favorable" to the mega tourism enterprise of Praia Grande, on the coast of Silves, next to Lagoa dos Salgados, issued on October 30, 2013 by the Secretary of State for the Environment.
The Platform of Friends of Lagoa dos Salgados, which integrates the environmental protection associations SPEA, A Rocha, League for the Protection of Nature, Quercus, Geota and Almargem, also intends to declare the nullity of the decision of the Chamber of Silves that, in March 2012, it formally approved the project proposed by Finalgarve – Sociedade dePromoção Imobiliária e Turística SA, a company of the Galilei Group, linked to the former group of the controversial BPN, announced as involving an investment of more than 230 million euros.
The Platform may publish a joint position on this issue today, with details on the lawsuit.
A DAY that environmental associations are now contesting it concerns only a part of the Praia Grande mega-project, specifically Execution Unit 1 of the Detailed Plan. This first phase includes the construction of an 18-hole golf course, three hotels and two tourist villages, covering an area of approximately 108 hectares. It presents as complementary projects the Praia Grande Environmental Park and the UE2, UE3, UE4 and UE5.
To what Sul Informação He found that this legal proceeding brought by the six associations is based on the fact that the promoter did not give any alternative location for the project, nor did he properly assess its economic, social, cultural and landscape impacts.
The Platform's action also contests that the project did not consider it to be a protected area under the Berne Convention on Wildlife and Natural Habitats in Europe, which Portugal adopted in 1982 and is considered to be a binding international instrument.
The project planned for the only coastal area in the municipality of Silves that has not yet been built led to an online petition against the mega-development of Praia Grande, which collected more than 20 signatures, and was delivered by the Platform of Friends of Lagoa dos Salgados, in January 8, 2013 to the then Ministry of Agriculture, Sea, Environment and Spatial Planning.
It was in the wake of this petition, of two demonstrations next to Lagoa dos Salgados, and the controversy that soon arose in the media against the project that the Secretary of State for the Environment decided to submit the tourism project to an environmental impact assessment. But the DIA turned out to be favorable to the project, albeit with conditions.
It is this situation that the six associations intend to change, with this joint legal action.
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