Just a Change
Just a Change is a Portuguese non-profit that renovates homes for people living in housing poverty, relying entirely on volunteer labour. Si…
Community & Social Innovation
The heart of the catalogue: intentional communities like Tamera and Traditional Dream Factory, farm retreats like Four Trees, conscious coliving like Noma Village, and village cafés like O Cais in Silves. People organising new ways to live together.
Grow lists 90 off-grid communities to visit, stay or work atHe booked the first flight he saw – a flight to Faro
LPN bought 1,800 hectares of Castro Verde to save its birdsLPN seeks new income amid EU conservation funding uncertainty
Biggest Mini Forest turns 3x3 metre plots into food forestsPlot Zero: the first mini food forest, and what it changed
Quinta dos 7 Nomes
Quinta dos 7 Nomes is an ecological cooperative founded in 2007 in Colares, Sintra, running a permaculture lab, an organic grocery shop, com…
Terras Dentro – Associação para o Desenvolvimento Integrado
Terras Dentro is a non-profit association based in Alcáçovas, active since 1991, dedicated to the sustainable development of rural territori…
QRER – Cooperativa para o Desenvolvimento dos Territórios de Baixa Densidade
QRER is a service cooperative based in Loulé that promotes sustainable development, entrepreneurship and nature and cultural tourism across …
Gaia Colos
Gaia Colos is a food hub, café and shop in Colos, Odemira, run as a project of Cooperativa Integral da Terra. It sells local produce and ser…
Cooperativa Integral da Terra
Cooperativa Integral da Terra is a self-financed cooperative network connecting around 33 small producers, artisans and businesses between S…
Guarda Rios Ecovillage
Guarda Rios Ecovillage is a young ecovillage on 24 hectares beside the River Mondego, near Nelas, Viseu, started in 2022. Four resident memb…
CASES – Cooperativa António Sérgio para a Economia Social
CASES is a Portuguese public interest cooperative that represents and supports the social economy sector, including cooperatives, associatio…
Regional youth programme funds 14 social enterprise projects with €35,673
From saxophone days to a school-visiting student band and a biosphere project, the funded ideas are more varied than the modest total suggests.
Cacela Velha to host barter market without money
For one afternoon in Cacela Velha, goods and services will change hands without a single euro involved.
Livre to hold Portimão debate on heatwaves and inequality
Three specialists gather in Portimão to link last winter's heavy rains to a wider pattern of climate injustice.
Porto shortlisted for European Green Capital 2028
Porto faces four other European cities for a title that comes with €600,000 in funding.
Alentejo coastal meeting to debate farming, energy and tourism
From a beach in Melides to a march through Sines, three days of debates tackle what is reshaping the Alentejo coast.
Guimarães to hold litter-picking walk and sustainability talk
A walk along the Caminho de Torres will mix pilgrimage tradition with picking up litter along the way.
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Twelve Months, Twelve Walks
Prazilândia – Turismo e Ambiente E.M. once again joins forces with the Município de Castanheira de Pera to run, throughout 2026, another edition of the "Doze Meses, Doze Caminhadas" program. This year's edition offers a varied itinerary covering the history, culture and biodiversity of the Castanheira de Pera municipality, which includes the Aldeia do Xisto do Coentral. Each activity is designed to provide an educational and leisure experience, in full harmony with the environment…
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GEOTA Training Course – Coastal Ecosystems: Biodiversity, Coastal Management and Eco-citizenship
GEOTA is running a 20-hour training course on coastal ecosystems, biodiversity, coastal management and eco-citizenship, in both online and in-person format, aimed at teachers, students, technicians and the general public, between 28 September and 31 October.
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Coastwatch Training Course
GEOTA TRAINING COURSE | COASTAL ECOSYSTEMS: BIODIVERSITY, COASTAL MANAGEMENT AND ECO-CITIZENSHIP. A 20-hour training course with scientific-pedagogical accreditation for groups 420 and 520. 📍 Format: online and in-person. Secure your place and actively contribute to the futu...
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Permaculture Design Learning Community
A two-week certified permaculture design programme at Quinta Vale da Lama in Lagos, combining design, hands-on practice and community learning alongside parallel art and volunteering programmes. Limited subsidised places are available for those with financial constraints.
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Sustainability Days at the University of Coimbra 2026
The University of Coimbra is holding the 4th edition of Sustainability Days, with sessions, debates and an international conference on AI and sustainability, running from 30 September to 15 October at Polo I and the Jardim Botânico.
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Hands-on in the Solar Test Field & Garden
A 12-day hands-on programme at Tamera combining garden and solar test field work with community-building activities like Forum, focused on regenerative living and energy autonomy.
Intentional communities and social innovation in Portugal
This is the collection people arrive at when the question is less about a technique and more about how to live near other people.
Tamera in the Alentejo has been running for decades. Traditional Dream Factory and Noma Village are newer, closer to coliving than to a commune, and built around remote work. Four Trees is a farm retreat. O Cais in Silves is a village café that works as a meeting point. What they share is that someone decided the default arrangement was not the only one available.
The focus filter above separates ecovillages, intentional communities, cooperatives and collectives, retreat centres, community resilience, social permaculture, volunteering and social impact, and animal sanctuaries. If you are looking for a way in rather than a place to read about, check the jobs and volunteering listings, several of these communities recruit through them. Dated activities from these projects are listed in our events calendar.