A Spanish company has ploughed up and destroyed a Roman bridge and a Roman villa in Beja in order to plant an almond orchard.
This is a further example of the destruction of archaeological remains to make way for agriculture as, in recent years, there have been several cases where olive groves, almond trees, vines, eucalyptus forests and pine trees have been seen as far more important than Portugal’s buried history.
The latest known case has seen the Spanish company De Prado Portugal S.A, Rua da Fonte, Beja, destroy almost two dozen archaeological sites while preparing ground to plant almond trees.
These Roman sites include "a bridge, an aqueduct and a villa," all of which were marked in Beja’s Municipal Master Plan but have ended up trashed by the Spanish company which has been using stone removal machinery and deep ploughing.
The Regional Directorate of Culture of Alentejo reported the case to the Public Prosecutor's Office and the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage, calling for the suspension of work, but the trashing of Portugal’s history continues as not one agency has taken direct action, preferring to make reports and ponder who is responsible.
With the government’s aim of boosting agriculture, the destruction of Roman, Iron Age and medieval remains has been unchallenged throughout the Alentejo with some sites being ploughed up and the unearthed remains, including ceramic fragments, worked stones and coins, picked up and sold off.
De Prado Portugal S.A continues to trash Portugal’s history and Portugal’s myriad of agencies and government departments have opted to do nothing.
In the Algarve, the region's largest and most important Roman site is the old port of Balsa, near Luz da Tavira, where a Spanish fruit company was seen off by an effective intervention by the Regional Directorate of Culture for the Algarve.
See 'Eastern Algarve - Roman port of Balsa finally to being protected'