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Draft Resolution No. 198 /X

Promotion of Low Mondego

Situated on the Coastal Edge, the Valley of the Low Mondego corresponds to an extensive plain

of alluvial origin, which globally permakes about 14,000 hectares, situated between the

cities of Coimbra and the Figueira da Foz.

It consists of a strip that develops along the Mondego River-the Valley

Main-and by some lateral ramifications, which constitute their tributaries-the

Secondary Valleys-cases of the rivers Cernache, Ega, Ardump and Pranto, on the margin

left, and Ançã and Foja on the right margin.

Administratively it is dispersed by five municipalities in the district of Coimbra:

Montemor-o-Velho, Figueira da Foz, Coimbra, Soure and Conlet-a-Nova.

The distribution of the covered area is as follows:

Main Valley 59.7%

upstream and intermediate zones 51.1%

downstream zone 8.6%

Secondary Valleys 40.3%

Ançon / S. Facundo (right margin) 1.4%

Cernache / Arzila (left margin) 2.2%

Ega (left margin) 4.3%

Trunks (left margin) 11.0%

Foja (right margin) 6.1%

Pranto (left margin) 15.3%.

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Despite endowed with high agricultural productive potential, every strategy for the

taking advantage of the Low Mondego and, in particular, its Main Valley, if it has

debated with strangulation factors, of which they deserve special relevance:

 Filled violent and frequent floods, subjecting the Valley to prolonged flooding and the

a continued assorting process;

 Pronounced seasonal and annual caudal variability;

 High deposition rates of solid trawling material, reaching

average values of about 20 mm/ano;

 Quite incipient agricultural drainage network and very unfunctional, network

of insufficient and degraded rega and near-non-existent road network, hindering the

access to agricultural holdings;

 Disordered and scattered funday-to-day structure, with numerous buildings, from large

differentiations of size and shape.

However, the hydroagricultural use of Low Mondego constitutes a component

of all the hydraulic use of the Low Mondego.

Hydraulic harness encompasses also the regularization of flow and the defence

against floods, the supply of water for consumption and other activities

economic, as well as the production of electrical energy.

The construction of the dams of the Aguieira, Border and Anger and the açude of Coimbra

allowed for the regularization of flow in the Mondego River. These works are completed there are

several years and are being used for the production of electrical energy, as is known.

The regularization of the river and the construction of dikes, between Coimbra and Figueira da Foz,

allowed the defence of the populations and their assets.

The construction of the General Conductive Canal and the Canal of Lares allowed the supply

of water to the various economic activities and populations, even not having been done

their regulation.

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However, the most forgotten component of all the interventions in the Valley concerns the

regularization of the affluent rivers-Ega, Ardump, Pranto and Foja and riverside of Ançan.

The only project to have started was the regularisation of the Ardump River. However, the work was

abandoned in half. The regularization of the remaining tributaries has not passed, even, yet

of the project phase.

Rice continues to be the predominant cultivation in the region, occupying 50 a to 60% percent of its

area, with greater deployment in the middle and downstream areas of the Main Valley, well

as in the Secondary Valleys of Ançan / S. Facundo, Ardump, Foja and Pranto. The area

rest is essentially occupied by the culture of the corn-grain, as other crops,

as the horto-industrial and the sugar beet, they still bear a heavy weight

restricted.

The hydroagricultural advantage of the Low Mondego began in 1978, with the

designation and installation of a project team of the Directorate General of Hydraulics and

Agricultural Engineering (DGHEA) in exclusive dedication. On that date, the

perimeter of rega, with an area of 13,570 hectares, which has subdivided into 18 blocks.

Up to 2004 have been equipped 9 blocks of rega, with a project area of 5,355

hectares, being in course three blocks (Bollion, Majorca and the Left Margin) with a

area of 1,470 hectares. They are standing out on this date, hence 6 blocks of rega, with

a total area of 5,775 hectares.

It was intended to equip each of these blocks with secondary eschee networks, from

drainage and pathways, duly adapted to a new planning

rustic property, through the venture of rural emparceling operations.

The component of funday-to-day restructuring has been felt, by farmers

covered, such as the measure of greater impact on the strengthening of the technical-agricultural strands

and socio-economic. This, essentially, because in the face of the original fun-like structure,

based on a deeply fragmented, dispersed and irregular predial mesh and, in

consequence, very little functional, the outorga of some new batches submitted to

a radical and deep geometric and physical alteration, entirely remodeled and

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corrected in their asymmetries, represented an important action of planning

sustained from these agricultural spaces, potentiating the economic dynamisation of all the

interventional areas.

In the entire Lower Mondego Valley there are, however, about 6,500 farms

agricultural, the one that corresponds to about 35,000 rustic buildings.

Complementing with the actions already undertaken of rural emparcelment, the

adaptation to the regadio, substantiated in the preparation, regularization and levelling of the

land, has had, when applied, a huge positive impact on the incomes of the

farmers. The dissemination and completion of this type of fundials improvements in

all the Lower Mondego Valley allowed the recovery and the correction of vast

stains of soils still something irregular and, even, unproductive.

Thus,

Considering the expressive environmental, energy and socio-economic dimension of which

is the situation described;

Taking into attention the relevant agro-economic and landscape potential of the Valley of the

Mondego, as well as the significantly positive socio-economic consequences

of a full and orderly use;

Taking into account the sustainable and modern character that an intervention of

structural character in the Mondego Valley could rewear in areas of future such as the

agro-industrial, energy (production in classical terms and from sources

renewables) and the agro-tourism and environmental;

Pondering that a management sustainable and a regulatory autonomy would imply,

also, the promotion of public-private partnerships, with the inherent advantages to

all the parties involved;

Considering the superior public interest arising from effective protection and security

of persons and goods that through such an intervention may come to be acauteled;

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Attending to the superior turf-economic value of a project involving the

navigability of the Mondego River;

Taking into account the potential for environmental valorisation and quality of life

that an appropriate and assumed sustained development strategy can take on,

not only for the populations in the region, but for the whole Country, considered to be

of this microcosm,

In these terms, the Assembly of the Republic recommends the Government to adopt and do

apply to the entire region of the Lower Mondego Valley, situated between Coimbra and the Figueira

of Foz, a structured and consequent strategy of rational development and

sustained, contemplating, specifically, the following objectives:

a) Regularization of the Ardump rivers (8 Kms), Pranto (20 Kms), Ega (8.5 Kms),

Foja (8 Kms), Ribeira of Ançan and of the Vala of Vale Travesso;

b) Compatibilization of water regularization with production and availability

of energy for farms and populations;

c) Construction of the Elevatory Stations of the Ardump, Ega, Pranto and Quada-Lares;

d) Environmental Recovery from the Central Leite of the Mondego and the Peripheral Bed

Right;

(e) Rehabilitation of the General Conductive Channel;

f) Remodeling the fish ladder from the fishbridge-Coimbra bridge;

(g) reconstruction of the infrastructure affected by the Chees of 2001;

h) Constitution of associations of users composed of all or

part of users of the water public domain of a basin or a

hydrographic sub-basin, to which the following rights would be assigned:

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-To the receipt of part of the values resulting from the collection of the fee on

water resources, upon the conclusion of contracts-programa;

-To the delegation of competences, by the Hydrographic Region Administration,

of all or part of the waters covered by the headings of use

managed by each association;

-preferably in the allocation of licences or concessions;

-To grant the full or partial exploitation of purpose ventures

multiples;

i) Implementation of a water management system;

j) Improvement of acessibilities in the Valley and their relationship with the

exterior;

k) Infrastructure of support for urban use of the Valley and the Mondego River,

conceiving the first as an intercity green corridor;

l) Appropriate Advantage of the entire agricultural productive potential,

notably through the promotion of funnelling emparcelings, da

organization of the owners and producers and of a planning

productions, stimulating, too, the promotion of agriculture by methods

biological;

m) Promotion of expressive and interested participation of citizens and

entities covered by the constant measures of such a strategy of

development.

Palace of Saint Benedict, March 20, 2007.

The Deputies