Rewilding Europe official praises Côa Valley business network

In an interview, Victor van Dooren, Enterprise Director at Rewilding Europe, outlines the organisation's 2030 strategy to build nature-based economies around rewilding, focusing on tourism, local businesses and diversified funding. He highlights the Wilder Places platform, launched to connect tourism providers with visitors, and points to 2026 as a key year for proving its value. Van Dooren praises the Rede Côa Selvagem in Portugal's Grande Vale do Côa as a successful example of businesses collaborating around rewilding, saying its steady revenue growth shows the model can genuinely shift local economies, and urges other landscapes to treat socioeconomic development as seriously as ecological restoration.