The Italian Embassy in Lisbon organised a webinar on “Drought: Climate Change and Management of Water Resources. Challenges and Opportunities for Cooperation between Italy and Portugal” attended by about 300 Italian and Portuguese companies. The initiative – added to the 2022 Festival of Sustainable Development calendar and organised in association with the Italian Chamber of Commerce for Portugal and the Italian Trade Agency (ICE) – had a twofold objective: one, to increase the level of synergy between companies in the two countries on innovative, technologically advanced solutions to manage water resources and fight drought and its effects, and two, to help spread the culture of sustainability in accordance with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for 2030.
Italian Ambassador in Lisbon, Carlo Formosa opened the meeting, and reaffirmed Italy’s commitment to sustainable development to both manage water resources and help find new solutions that guarantee a safe and prosperous future at global level. The President of the Portuguese National Emergency Authority and Civil Protection, José Manuel Duarte da Costa emphasised the growing importance of coordination at international level to manage emergencies linked to drought, temperature increases, fires and desertification, acting on both the causes and the effects of climate change.
President of the Board of Directors of the Institute for the Conservation of Nature and Forests and Coordinator of the Portuguese National Observatory on Desertification, Nuno Banza, and Manager of the Institute of Bioeconomy Drought Observatory of the National Research Council, Ramona Magno also took part in the webinar, while the companies involved presented a number of technologically advanced tools to monitor crops in agricultural areas and manage forests in order to prevent forest fires.
