1º National Rewilding Symposium
Organizers: Rewilding Portugal e Cascais Ambiente
Location: Quinta do Pisão
Year: 2022
THE EVENT:
On 22 and 23 September 2022, the first ever symposium on rewilding took place in Portugal, promoted by Rewilding Portugal in partnership with the Municipality of Cascais, through Cascais Ambiente.
Two full days were dedicated to rewilding, ecological restoration, nature conservation, the economic potential of these approaches, and the future of our land use planning and our protected areas and natural parks, with various panels of experts in the various fields related to this approach to nature conservation and the public policies that directly and indirectly influence it.
The event was broadcast openly to the entire online audience, in addition to its in-person version.
You can watch it via the following links for the first and second days respectively:
https://youtu.be/jqgepjYcIPA e https://youtu.be/hRIE19mlE74
PROGRAMME:
DAY 1 – 22 SEPTEMBER
09.00 – Welcome to participants and introduction to the event agenda [Pedro Prata, Executive Director of Rewilding Portugal & Joana Presas Pinto Balsemão, Councillor of the Cascais Municipal Council]
Block 1 – The rewilding approach to ecological restoration
09:15 – What is rewilding and the results after 10 years of this approach to nature conservation in Europe [Raquel Filgueiras, Head of Rewilding at Rewilding Europe]
09:45 – Jordi Palau, Director of the Boumort National Game Reserve at the Generalitat de Catalunya
10:15 – Scaling up ecological restoration through rewilding [Henrique Miguel Pereira, Co-Director of the Biodiversity and Conservation Research Centre at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv); Professor at CIBIO/BIOPOLIS]
10:45 – Discussion and Q&A session
12:00 – Lunch break
Block 2 – National and international commitments: the potential of the rewilding approach to meet ecological restoration and nature conservation goals in Portugal
13:00 – The proposed new European nature restoration law [Humberto Delgado Rosa, Director for Natural Capital at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for the Environment]
1:30 p.m. – Carlos Albuquerque, ICNF
2:00 p.m. – Making Portugal a wilder place – the example of the Greater Côa Valley [Pedro Prata, Executive Director of Rewilding Portugal]
2:30 p.m. – Discussion and Q&A session
3:45 p.m. – Coffee break
Block 3 – The case of rural fires and extensive grazing in a semi-wild regime
4:00 p.m. – Biodiversity, carbon sequestration and fire risk in scrublands in Galicia with wild horses [Jaime Fagundez, Professor in the Department of Animal Biology, Plant Biology and Ecology at the University of A Coruña]
16:30 – SGIFR – new opportunities for extensive grazing [Helga Soares, Regional Coordinator of the Integrated Rural Fire Agency]
17:00 – Rewilding and fire risk: the role of herbivores [Francisco Moreira, Principal Investigator of the Biodiversity in Agricultural and Forest Ecosystems research group at the Centre for Research in Biodiversity and Genetic Resources (CIBIO)]
17:30 – Discussion session and questions and answers
19:00 – Conclusion of the first day of the symposium
21:00 – Evening outing for bird listening and bat watching at Quinta do Pisão (subject to prior registration)
DAY 2 – 23 SEPTEMBER
Block 4 – Ecological restoration strategies at the landscape scale and management of protected and classified areas
09:45 – Landscape Plan in Cascais [João Cardoso de Melo, Director of Ecological Structure Management at Cascais Ambiente]
10:15 – Joaquim Teodósio, Coordinator of the Terrestrial Conservation Department of the Portuguese Society for the Study of Birds (SPEA)
10:45 – Discussion and Q&A session
12:00 – Lunch break
Block 5 – Nature-based economy and private sector involvement
13:30 – Symington: Promoting Biodiversity in the Wine Ecosystem [Ana Salomé, Administrator of Symington Family Estates]
14:00 – Into the wild [João Meneses, Secretary General of BCSD Portugal]
14:15 – The economic potential of rewilding [Catarina Roseta Palma, Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at ISCTE-Lisbon University Institute]
14:30 – Discussion and Q&A session
16:00 – Closing ceremony of the symposium [Carlos Carreiras, Mayor of Cascais]
Visit to Quinta do Pisão with Ambiente Cascais
17:00 – Visit to Quinta do Pisão (subject to prior registration)
19:00 – End of the day
