We live in times when unexpected events, floods, storms, landslides or structural failures, expose, with brutal clarity, the fragility of the Portuguese State. Every time a family loses their home, every time a street is destroyed or a community is isolated, we realize that it is not just the climate that fails.
It is a State that remains incapable of predicting, preventing and protecting. These episodes are no exceptions: they are a mirror of a country where too many people live at risk while waiting for answers that arrive late, poorly or simply not at all. It is not an ideological issue, nor a debate between environmentalists. It is, above all, a matter of protecting people.
In Portugal, too many families live in precarious situations, in unfit houses, in areas that remain without structural works year after year. And when a risk situation arises, it is always the same people who suffer: those who have less, those who live further away from large centers, those who depend on public support that arrives late or simply does not arrive.
It is in this context that I undertake my international work, as President of the Portuguese Delegation of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union for the Mediterranean (AP-UpM) and President of the Energy, Environment and Water Committee of the same organization, the only committee of this type led by Portugal in the Euro-Mediterranean space. My mission is not just to discuss environmental goals, but to defend the interests of our country: our security, our resources, the defense of the territory and support for the populations.
At COP30, which took place this week in Belém do Pará, Brazil, I participated as an official representative of Portugal, alongside the Minister of the Environment and deputies from the Parliamentary Committee on the Environment. And it is clear, on this international stage, that many of the problems do not just lie in the climate, they lie in the inability of States to fulfill what they promise, in the bureaucracy that paralyzes decisions and in the lack of strategy that leaves entire communities vulnerable.
We too often witness debates dominated by economic interests, funding disputes and NGOs that put the financial agenda ahead of people. There is a lot of talk about “transition”, little about who is left behind during this process. And it is exactly this lack of pragmatism that Portugal cannot accept.
The country has international goals and commitments, aligned with the European Union. But the most important thing is not the goals, it is the Portuguese families. And that means acting where it matters: ensuring security, carrying out structural works, supporting those in need, planning seriously and, above all, assuming political responsibility.
My presence at COP30 and AP-UpM reinforces what I have always defended: that Portugal needs a strong, pragmatic and people-focused policy. Less propaganda, more action. Less international speeches, more results on the ground. Fewer vague commitments, more protection for communities.
I do not defend an ideological environmentalism that lives on slogans. I defend a State that works, that invests where it is needed and that is always at the side of those who need it. The tragedies we witness, small or large, discreet or publicized, remind us that protecting the environment means protecting people. And protecting people is the State’s first duty.
The future requires responsibility, science, rigor and, above all, courage. Courage to tell the truth, to admit that time is running out and that environmental policy cannot continue to be just a chapter in international discourses. It must be a policy of life, which defends families, territories and everyone’s security.
It is this vision that I take with me, in every international intervention and in every national discussion. Because taking care of the environment means taking care of people and that is what should move Portugal forward.
Economist and deputy to the Assembly of the Republic