When you think of a visit to Portugal, do Lisbon and Porto spring to mind, or perhaps the Algarve coast further south? Well, a multi-million euro investment is hoping to shift the spotlight beyond the usual popular spots – redrawing Portugal’s tourist map, one inland region at a time.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
The government is bankrolling 12 tourism projects to the tune of €4.5 million. With a total investment of around €11 million, the projects will boost tourism across the north and central areas of Portugal, as well as the Alentejo and Ribatejo regions.
This is part of the broader "Growing with Tourism" initiative, which launched in February 2025 and has a budget of €30 million.
The latest allocated funds are earmarked for public, private and associative entities and prioritises key sectors, including the nature, gastronomy, active, wellness and cultural tourism fields.
The ambitious projects will also focus on creating new tourism products, promoting smart territories, and revitalising historical and cultural heritage, as well as advancing sustainability and urban regeneration.
Funding will support upskilling drives, like training and capacity-building programmes for workers in vulnerable circumstances within the sector.
When the deal for the investment contracts was inked, Castro Almeida, Minister of Economy and Territorial Cohesion, acknowledged that while there are larger projects that can develop without the need for so much state support, there are also smaller projects, “particularly in inland areas, aimed at enhancing cultural and natural heritage, which are highly appealing and novel for foreign visitors”.
For Almeida, these smaller scale tourism projects must be “promoted and made known”.
In 2025, Portugal welcomed 32.5 million visitors, including 19.7 million international visitors, according to data released by Turismo de Portugal.
The country’s top inbound markets were the UK and US, which had 2.5 million and 2.4 million visitors respectively, followed by Spain, Germany and France, which also recorded arrivals in the millions.
While the national tourism body also said the surge in visitors generated €29.1 billion in tourism receipts, local communities have increasingly become disgruntled over the sky-high volume of arrivals in major destinations such as Lisbon and Porto.
Last year, UK newspaper The Guardian did a deep dive into overtourism in Portugal and Spain, and spoke to residents who have been engulfed by tourist accommodations.
“It’s very weird. Imagine, I have no neighbours, even though I’m in the middle of a big city,” said a Lisbon local, where a growing number of homes are rented to tourists. They added that this has left parts of the Portuguese capital feeling like a "ghost place”.
Almeida’s outlook on tourism is more optimistic. He referred to it as a “very important activity” that “pulls the country upwards”.
He added: “In one week or another of the year, or in one place or another in the country, there may be too much tourism, but overall, across the country and over the course of the year, we do not have too many tourists.”