The Algarve is to host a €220 million investment in solar energy, "the largest ever in Portugal" according to media reports and the rural council of Alcoutim is the chosen location.
The Portuguese Environment Agency has received an application for the licencing of the photovoltaic plant which will produce 200 megawatts from thousands of panels on an 800 hectare site.
Portuguese families continue to face serious difficulties in paying their mortgages.
According to data from the Central Credit Register of the Bank of Portugal, more than 660,000 Portuguese families currently are in default on their mortgage repayments.
During the 2013 key tourist season of July and August, Hugo Gonçalves decided to occupy himself with robbing tourists at gun point.
The victims he chose were predominantly women and he attacked them in the early hours or near to dawn as they returned from 'a good night out.'
One result of the global recession has been the increase in child poverty in developed countries.
Unicef reports that the rate has gone up in more than half of the developed world since 2008, bringing the total number of children there in poverty to an estimated 76.5 million.
New suspects are to be interviewed by Portuguese police in the Madeleine McCann enquiry, two of them are British expats who were living in Portugal at the time of the girl’s disappearance in 2007.
The two British men have been declared formal suspects, or arguidos, and local police will be questioning them later this month and will obtain DNA samples.
New global rules to stop tax-payer bail-outs of banks are being formulated by global regulator the Financial Stability Board.
In future, big banks will have to hold more money in order to survive big losses while shareholders would be the first to suffer losses if banks could not pay from their own resources.
A group of scientists in Italy sentenced to prison for failing to predict an earthquake has had that verdict overthrown.
The March 2009 earthquake in L’Aquila caused the deaths of 309 people as well as the destruction of many of the medieval town’s buildings.
Great news for the Algarve as Lisbon’s 2015 budget contains plans for a ‘per night’ tourist tax to start in 2016, and an airport tax to start next year.
Lisbon’s City Hall is planning to charge a tax for each overnight stay in the capital, up to seven nights, in a move to increase council income at the expense of hoteliers, and ultimately the tourists themselves.
