Algarve will have two Innovation Hubs to promote the Mediterranean Diet

Two poles represent a total investment of around 2 million euros, financed by the Recovery and Resilience Plan

after Tavira, Faro there will also be a Mediterranean Diet Innovation Hub. The financing contracts for the creation of both infrastructures were signed this Tuesday, May 31, with the minister Maria do Céu Antunes defending that it is from the Algarve that they want to increase the adhesion of all Portuguese to the Mediterranean Diet. .

This morning, the minister visited the Algarve Regional Directorate of Agriculture and Fisheries (DRAPAlg), in Patacão, on the outskirts of Faro, the space where another Innovation Hub will be implemented.

The creation of such an infrastructure, in Tavira, at the old Posto Agrário, was already known, but the novelty is the creation of a Pole also in Faro.

Pedro Valadas Monteiro, regional director for Agriculture and Fisheries in the Algarve, explained that, in Tavira, the space will be even «more dedicated to the Mediterranean Diet».

Already at the Pole of Faro, the idea is to further promote «organic, sustainable and citrus farming».

 

Pedro Valadas Monteiro – Photo: Pedro Lemos | Sul Informação

 

What is certain is that both infrastructures appear with a major objective: to promote the Mediterranean Diet, through research, training and dissemination.

The work has already begun: the creation of two preserves of horse mackerel and mackerel, in partnership with savory and the VRSA School of Hospitality and Tourism, is the first example, but more will follow.

The planned activities also include an exhibition and a book about the Tavira Agricultural Experimentation Center and a competition for ideas for the creation of logos for the two Innovation Hubs.

In the more agricultural part, in both infrastructures, fields of mother plants will be established, of the species in which there has been greater demand for the installation of commercial production orchards, such as carob, fig, almond and citrus trees, based on the collections of existing regional germplasm.

The fields of carob, fig and almond trees will be installed in Tavira; citrus ones will be kept in Faro.

Also in Tavira, pitaya will be planted, a collection of clones of the Negra Mole variety and maintenance and characterization of existing fruit tree collections, as pear of Monchique.

Already in Faro, tests of horticultural crops in organic food and avocado trees are planned.

 

Maria do Céu Antunes – Photo: Pedro Lemos | Sul Informação

 

Speaking to journalists, Maria do Céu Antunes, Minister of Agriculture and Food, explained that the objective of these centers is to “increase adherence to the Mediterranean Diet”.

«All the work developed here will be about that. If, on the one hand, we need to know the past, the history of what was built here, of these fantastic collections, we also have to know how to respond to the challenges of today”, he added.

The official defended that the two poles “have a regional importance, but also a national one”.

This is because they arise to «promote the Mediterranean Diet and sustainable food and it is from the Algarve that we want to encourage the Portuguese to adhere to this type of food», he said.

There is even an established goal: «we want to end this cycle of investments with at least 20% more citizens joining this diet», defined Maria do Céu Antunes.

«The Algarve has immense potential, but we have to know how to take advantage of it, even because we have a structural problem, which is the lack of water», he concluded.

 

Photos: Pedro Lemos | Sul Informação

 

 

 



Comments

Ads