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Good practice Imported

Portugal's National Extensive-Grazing Payment Scheme for Rural Fire Fuel Reduction

Portugal · Lisbon · See the Portugal profile · See the Lisbon profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 47% 47/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

In February 2026 Portugal launched a €30M/year national payment scheme — €120/ha for baldio (commons) fuel management plus per-head grazing subsidies (€150/suckler cow, €30/sheep or goat) — paying farmers to graze down wildfire fuel loads, building on AGIF's existing 86,000 ha of

Portugal's National Extensive-Grazing Payment Scheme for Rural Fire Fuel Reduction

Details

Promoter
IFAP – Instituto de Financiamento da Agricultura e Pescas; AGIF – Agência para a Gestão Integrada de Fogos Rurais; Ministério do Ambiente e Energia; Ministério da Agricultura e Mar
Period
2026–ongoing
Keywords
wildfire prevention, extensive grazing, agri-environment payments, rural development

Context

Portugal's Sistema de Gestão Integrada de Fogos Rurais (SGIFR), coordinated by the fire-management agency AGIF since 2020, promotes a landscape-mosaic strategy in which managed pastures, forests and wetlands act as barriers to large-fire spread. On 9 February 2026 the Ministries of Environment and Energy and of Agriculture and Sea created a dedicated extensive-grazing subsidy, funded up to €30 million a year by the Fundo Ambiental and administered by IFAP through its Pedido Único portal from 16 February 2026. It has two lines: a €7.5M/year baldio (commons) fuel-management payment and a €15M/year headage payment for livestock grazing designated fire-risk areas, extending AGIF's earlier pilot payment-for-ecosystem-services schemes into a national, budgeted instrument.

Implementation
Indicative cost
High (€500k–€5M) — €30M/year total: €7.5M/year baldio fuel-management line at ~€120/ha, €15M/year headage payments at €150/suckler cow and €30/sheep or goat, funded by the Fundo Ambiental.
Time to results
Long (> 3 years) — Regulation published 9 Feb 2026; applications open via IFAP's Pedido Único portal from 16 Feb 2026.
Staffing & skills
IFAP administrative staff, AGIF technical staff, baldio (commons) management committees, livestock farmers/pastoralists

Conditions for success

  • Sufficient uptake by baldio committees and livestock farmers in fire-prone interior regions — earlier AGIF pilots (e.g. Alto Tâmega) reached only ~52% execution
  • Continued cross-ministerial funding via the Fundo Ambiental
  • A functioning Pedido Único application portal at IFAP

Common failure modes

  • Low farmer/committee uptake, as previously seen in the Alto Tâmega pilot (~52% execution)

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

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