PS-Madeira renews call for agricultural reserve

PS-Madeira reacted on Tuesday to Agriculture secretary Nuno Maciel's support for agricultural reserves during a debate on the future of Madeiran agriculture promoted by the Ordem dos Engenheiros the previous day. Deputy Sílvia Silva accused him of saying one thing and doing another, saying his government had been the main obstacle to establishing a reserve to protect fertile land from real-estate speculation.

According to PS-Madeira, the Regional Secretariat for Agriculture, already led by Maciel, issued a negative opinion in 2025 on the party's proposed legal regime for an Agricultural Reserve of the Autonomous Region of Madeira. The party said the proposal would protect agricultural soils from improper uses, support regional food production and preserve the agricultural landscape, while allowing exceptions for housing for the family agricultural household and other compatible agricultural and livestock activities.

Silva said the Regional Spatial Planning Programme considers it fundamental to replace Madeira's transitional agricultural reserve regime, in force since 2011, with a definitive one. She said the secretariat had argued that reserve soils were already defined, that the transitional regime was sufficient and that municipal master plans already safeguarded agricultural land.

Regional planning director Ilídio Sousa defended the same position the previous day, according to the article, saying agricultural soils are protected through municipal planning instruments and that a reserve already exists in the region. He also said a good agricultural reserve is needed and that information is lacking on the aptitude of agricultural soils. Silva said the PS will again press its proposal, incorporating contributions that led to its rejection in the Assembly.

Sílvia Silva said Madeira's soil map is more than 30 years old and claimed that some of the island's most fertile soils have already been lost to urban expansion.

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