ALENTEJO - Economy
Low contribution to GDP
The Alentejo region, despite its large area, provided 6.3% of Portugal's GVA in 1999. Primary sector is the main one, contributing 15% to the region's GVA and representing 26% of this sector's GVA in Portugal. The main crops are cereals for grain as a rain-fed crop, whose output makes up over 75% of the country's total rain-fed cereals. In recent years, other crops have made their appearance and are becoming significant, such as oilseeds, especially sunflowers, which in this region account for 95% of the total area in Portugal under this crop, and some protein and feed crops. Among the irrigated crops, the most important are tomatoes, rice and maize. Olive oil and wine production are also significant, less for the quantities produced than for the quality they offer the consumer. In livestock production, the main products are meat (sheepmeat, beef and veal), sheep's wool and cheese. Cork, which accounts for over half of the world production, and eucalyptus wood are the main forestry products.
In the secondary sector, accounting for 27% of the GVA of the region, the extractive industries are particularly important. Their main activities are the extraction of ornamental stone and copper pyrites. This region produces 42% of the GVA of the national extractive industries. Ornamental stone production is at its highest in this region, which alone is responsible for 85% of national production of marble and 90% of the granite extracted in Portugal. The processing industry is not much developed and is poorly distributed over the region, the chemical and petroleum product industries are the main representative and are concentrated in the port and petrochemical complex of Sines. Next in importance are machinery and equipment manufacture, the timber and cork industries and the textile and clothing branch. The main firms are concentrated in Beja, Campo Maior, Évora, Portalegre, Sines, Vendas Novas and Vila Viçosa. The services sector account for 58% of the GVA of the region in 2000. The distributive trades play an important role in the tertiary sector since they represent over 80% of this sector's trade volume in the region.
Heavy dependence on agriculture, the extractive industries and retail trade
The Alentejo is a predominantly agricultural region and contains just under 50% of Portugal's utilised agricultural land. This activity is characterised by large farms and extensive cereal and oilseed production, livestock rearing and forestry production. Placing the emphasis on the quality of products has been one of the latest developments and the designation of "seal of origin" has been obtained for a considerable number of animal products. The region has optimum potential for irrigation and with the construction of the Alqueva reservoir and the implementation of the Alentejo Irrigation Plan, about 200 000 ha of land will benefit from irrigation. The increase in the irrigated areas will make it possible to develop the production of other types of food products and complementary activities such as hunting, tourism and water sports. There is not much of a processing industry tradition in the Alentejo. Production units are sparsely distributed and industrial complexes are underdeveloped except in the Sines industrial zone, where most of the processing industry is concentrated, in the form of the chemical and petroleum industries. The extractive industries, on the other hand, have important bases in this region and even show signs of encouraging the development of enterprises associated with the working of ornamental stone.
Productive services such as banking, insurance and commerce are undergoing some development in the Alentejo, especially in the larger urban areas where hypermarkets are also being established. In the rural areas, family-run small shops predominate. Most wholesale trading deal in products for agriculture, forestry and livestock farming, whilst the retail trade has more establishments selling food and drinks.
Productivity under the national average
In 2001, the productivity was 5% lower in the region than in the country as a whole. However, the different sectors do not follow the same trend. The productivity of the primary sector is largely higher than that of the country (95% more in 1999) and the situation is similar for the secondary sector, at a lesser degree however (21% more). The only sector having productivity under the national average is the tertiary sector. However, this sector concentrated 56% of the employment in 1999 and had productivity significantly under the national average, explaining the repercussion it has on the global productivity of the region. Still for the same year, the level of productivity in the region for the tertiary sector was 16% under those observed at national level.
A growing industry
The Natural Stone Industry is one of the oldest in Portugal as in the rest of the world. In Portugal, it exists a growing industry of marble, granite and limestone quarrying in Alentejo, Pero Pinheiro and Fátima Regions. Although the majority of the factories are located in Pero Pinheiro region, there has been a significant growth of factories around the Alentejo and Fátima quarries. It is believed that those regions will soon become very important centres of stone manufacturing. A great part of these industries produce standard material, using high technology, thus rapidly responding customer orders, which are essentially for exportation. These companies have well developed production lines with specialised staff, actively marketing their products either in the national and international markets. The existence of great reserves in natural stones in Portugal with ability for ornamental purposes has developed the interest of several investors in this industry and, as consequence, the growing of the technical-economical potentialities. To answer to the demands imposed by the markets, most of the plant units are prepared with human and technological resources capable of making a good selection of material and quality control of the stone.
Small family businesses
The Alentejo's industrial environment is characterised by a weak structure dominated by small production units, frequently family-based. The development process which this region has undergone in the second half of the century, has led to most enterprises being held by sole entrepreneurs (86%) with a low percentage of companies (11% private limited companies, 0.2% public companies and 0.6% co-operatives). This type of business structure has a direct influence on jobs and hence the majority of firms (98%) have fewer than 20 persons working for them.
On the other hand, the concentration of the population in small localities has a decisive influence in that most firms belong to the tertiary sector (52%), and are family businesses providing for the most rudimentary needs of the rural population. At the moment, this trend is being reversed and large capacity shops (usually hypermarkets) are being built in the centres of mass consumption. However, there are some sectors where a change has occurred in the business structure, as in the extractive industries, where the availability of natural resources has produced the right conditions for development. The region has almost 10% of all the extractive industry firms, with a sixth of all the industry's workers and a sales volume of over a fifth of the national total. It is also the region's extractive industry firms that employ on average the largest number of workers, although the large majority employ fewer than 20 persons. Recently, there have been changes in the processing industry following the implantation of large, mainly multinational firms in the Sines industrial zone and in Évora and Portalegre.
A wide variety of tourism products
With its varied and diversified tourist facilities, the Alentejo can respond to the most varied situations. Tourism in this region is developing in highly diverse fields: the seaside, camping, artificial lakes, golf, congresses and cultural events, hunting and fishing, rural tourism, agri-tourism, culture and heritage, gastronomy and handicrafts. The importance of tourism for this region having been recognised, major investments have been made, increasing the number of hotel and other establishments considerably so that the accommodation capacity has risen by 15% in the past six years, so that in 1996 it exceeded 7 000 beds, most of them in the Grândola (25%) and Évora municipalities (17%).
This region is an area of transit for tourists on their way to the Algarve and Spain, and as a result, fewer than 15% of the three million visitors who cross the region's borders take up accommodation in Alentejo's hotel establishments. Also, the average stay of tourists is short: 1.7 nights per guest, which results in occupancy rates of under 30%.
However, good access due to its proximity to the Lisboa metropolitan area and Spain, its cultural and nature heritage, hunting resources, high environmental quality standards and scenic and ethnographic advantages are guarantees of the intrinsec potential for this sector to continue its development.
High strategic value
The sea has a high strategic value in the Alentejo, because of the existence of an extensive coastal strip and a strategically located port infrastructure.
Fishing is done from a small number of small-capacity boats and their contribution to regional GDP is low (0.3%). In relation to the volume of fish landed, the only port of relevance is Sines, with catches of up to 4.5% of the national total in tonnage and 4% of the national total in value. As far as the species caught are concerned, sea-fish represent the largest contingent of over 90% of catches, with sardines accounting for some 80% of the overall fish catch landed.
This region has an extensive coastal strip of some 130 km, which has been the subject of various planning programmes aimed at improving quality and providing tourist services as an alternative to those of other national and international regions. The qualities of the Alentejo coastline have not gone unnoticed by investors, who have installed there one of the largest tourist complexes in the country. Currently, efforts to develop tourism are concentrated more to the south to exploit the scenic beauty of the beaches of Porto Côvo and Vila Nova de Mil Fontes. The development of the industrial centre created in Sines has led to the construction of a deep-water port with several terminals which is being prepared to take large vessels and serve as an alternative to the commercial ports of Lisboa and Setúbal. This port already handles 45% of the cargo loaded at Portuguese ports and 34% of the cargo unloaded on national territory. Furthermore, thanks to improved road access, there is the prospect of extending the zone of influence of the port of Sines to the Extremadura region of Spain.
In terms of highways, the region is linked to Lisbon, to the Algarve and Spain. Furthermore, the Sines harbour is the major infrastructure linking the area to the Atlantic Ocean and the whole world. Important airfields include the Military Base in Beja and the Municipal airfield in Evora, used intensively for sporting activities.
In terms of transport by sea, the volume of freight carried has been rather constant between 1997 and 2001. A total amount of 19.6 million tonnes were loaded or unloaded in the region in 2001. Compared to 1990, this represents a decrease by 13%, but the evolution of this volume during the 1990?s has been rather irregular.
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