Terra Sintrópica is a community-driven regeneration association in Mértola, Alentejo, working to restore semi-arid ecosystems through syntropic agroforestry and local food systems. Its three programmes, CARES, PREC and community education, link land regeneration with everyday community life.
Terra Sintrópica tests syntropic agroforestry on semi-arid land, runs a restaurant and local food hub, and brings ecological education into schools and homes in Mértola. The association was founded in 2018 and is based within the Natural Park of the Vale do Guadiana, in southern Portugal, where it works as a living laboratory of ecological transition. The region faces exhausted soils, water scarcity, rural abandonment and accelerating desertification. Terra Sintrópica's response is not to resist these forces but to regenerate the land and the community from within.
Its work covers agroecology, community building, local food systems and interdisciplinary research, organised into three programmes. CARES, the Centre for Agroecology and Regeneration for the Semi-Arid, is based at Horta da Malhadinha. There the association develops and tests regenerative agroforestry practices adapted to semi-arid climates, drawing on syntropic farming principles inspired by Ernst Götsch.
PREC (Regenerative Process in Progress) is a restaurant, café, grocery and local food hub. It connects producers, cooks and consumers through meals made from local, organic and regenerative produce. The third programme brings ecological education into schools and homes across the municipality, including a forest-garden project in five local schools.
The founders came from forestry, biology, journalism, nutrition and syntropic farming. Today the team covers strategy, agricultural operations, communications, project management and community facilitation. The association takes part in European cooperation projects, among them Erasmus+ RE2RE and Erasmus+ MAPPING. Locally it coordinates initiatives such as TerrAlimenta, which works to build short food circuits and food sovereignty in the Baixo Alentejo.
The association wants Mértola to become a model territory, showing that ecological regeneration, community resilience and new regenerative economies can coexist and thrive under climate change. It also wants to build a culture of care for the land that is shared across generations.
Our Goal
Terra Sintrópica aims to regenerate the semi-arid ecosystems of the Mértola region through syntropic agroforestry, agroecological transition and food systems rooted in the community. It wants Mértola to become a model for regeneration that other semi-arid territories can replicate.
Our Wishes
The project is looking for volunteers and kitchen staff. It would also like to hear from agroforestry practitioners willing to share data with its agroforestry mapping initiative, and from partners who can help expand short food supply circuits in the Baixo Alentejo.
