Portugal entered the 2026 fire season under intense heat and drought pressure. In July, Portugal requested firefighting support from the European Union, Spain, and Morocco, with more than 2,800 firefighters engaged at several blazes.
The report The Soil Carbon Sponge draws attention to a part of the story that receives far less attention: the state of the soil before drought and extreme heat set in. It identifies regenerative agriculture practices as a practical way to recover soil organic matter — the carbon-rich material that helps the soil form structure and retain water — and estimates that a 1% increase could add about 250,000 liters of water-retention capacity per hectare.
In The Soil Carbon Sponge report, Save Soil explains that soils with greater water retention can significantly reduce the impact of droughts and fires, helping crops and vegetation stay hydrated for longer, delaying the onset of extreme dryness in the landscape and easing pressure on water supply.
Across the European Union, the European Commission estimates that 60 to 70% of soils are not healthy. In Portugal, data from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre show that 5.2% of Portugal’s agricultural land is affected by moderate to severe water erosion (data from 2016).
For Portugal, the issue is not only how to extinguish fires after they break out, but how to make landscapes that are productive more able to withstand long periods of heat and water stress.
Praveena Sridhar, scientific and policy advisor for Save Soil, states that “Portugal is seeing the consequences of drought in real time — pressure on crops, on water and on communities. Regenerative agriculture gives us a way to act before the emergency, restoring organic matter and soil structure so that more rain is retained in the soil.”
“Keeping the soil covered, preserving living roots, diversifying crops, integrating trees and reducing unnecessary soil disturbance can help rebuild this natural sponge. We cannot control when it rains, but we can do much more to determine what happens to that water when it arrives at the soil.”
Portugal already has a soil and water adaptation model
In Alentejo, the European Climate-ADAPT platform documents the Freixo do Meio estate, where agroforestry, retention basins, soil cover, reduced disturbance and increased organic matter are used to improve infiltration and water retention and to build drought resilience.
It is a practical example of the same principle at the heart of the report: using agriculture and land management to keep more water in the landscape before drought intensifies.
Rewarding farmers who restore soil
The European Save Soil campaign, Healthy Soil, Healthy Future, argues that the EU’s Soil Monitoring Law should work in concert with the upcoming Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) — the EU’s main system of agricultural support and funding — so that farmers are rewarded for measurable improvements in soil health without bearing the cost of proving them.
The policy is being defined now: the current CAP runs until 2027; the European Commission proposed the next CAP for 2028–2034 on July 17, 2025; and EU agriculture ministers resumed debate on its contours on June 23, 2026. Save Soil calls for signing the campaign as governments of the EU and the Members of the European Parliament finalize the rules.
At the same time, governments are meeting at COP17 of the UNCCD, in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, from 17 to 28 August 2026 — the UN’s major global summit on land degradation and drought. Save Soil is present, advocating a stronger voice for farmers, better soil data, and agricultural financing that rewards long-term soil health.
Sridhar adds: “What the European water debate is missing is not just how much rain falls — it’s how much of that rain our land can retain.”
