Highlights

CASFIL participates in the largest native tree planting project in the Porto Metropolitan Area

CASFIL is the most recent patron of FUTURO, a project co-led by the Universidade Católica Portuguesa in Porto and the Porto Metropolitan Area (AMP), which has already planted more than 130.000 native trees in the Porto metropolitan area.

“CASFIL's membership in this project will help finance ecosystem restoration actions over the next four years that help transform plantation areas into native forests,” says Eduardo Cardoso, professor and researcher at the Escola Superior de Biotecnologia from the Universidade Católica Portuguesa and coordinator of CRE.Porto. Work that involves monitoring and restoration, planting and densification, replacement and recovery, cleaning and invasive control tasks. “By carrying out these actions, the goal is to ensure that the plantation actions become effective native forests,” he concludes.

Currently, actions are being planned in plots suitable for the objectives of Patronage Hectare in conjunction with municipalities in the CASFIL region. In total, this project is covered by 17 municipalities, totaling 2000km2, with the Porto Metropolitan Area being the second largest region in the country in terms of population (16% of the Portuguese population), where more than 90% of the forest territory is occupied with intensive industrial cultivation and only 6% of the forest territory is covered with native species.

Joining this project makes CASFIL committed to Sustainable Development Goals through concrete actions in the communities where the project is located, thus involving its employees in activities with an impact on the valorization of native forests, promoting biodiversity and ecosystem services.

“The HECTARE patronage program of the FUTURO project arises from the need to continue recovering territory for native forest, as well as monitoring the more than 130.000 native trees planted in the Porto Metropolitan Area, in order to consolidate the efforts made and have young forests established in four years,” explains Eduardo Cardoso.