Porto Academy students, Lisbon and decentralisation in Portugal

Sixty per cent of students at the Porto Academy believe they would stand a better chance of securing skilled employment and moving forward in their careers in Lisbon than in their own region, and almost 90% think that where we are born and live shapes the opportunities we have throughout life.

What Porto Academy students reveal about opportunities in Lisbon

These findings from the FAP Study Centre do more than explain why so many qualified young people leave the places where they grew up. Above all, they underline that Portugal still channels investment, decision-making power and opportunity into a single hub, even though there are clear signs that this approach is reaching its limits.

The figures behind centralisation in Portugal

The consequences are plain to see. Portugal ranks 20th in the European Union for the share of local and regional spending in GDP, at just 6.6%-around half of the European average. At the same time, it is the third EU country where the capital dominates the labour market most strongly when compared with the second-largest city. The gap between Lisbon and Porto is exceeded only by Greece and Hungary-two examples of territorial polarisation that we should not seek to emulate.

Concentration has never delivered results. It has left us more reliant on Lisbon and more exposed in relation to Europe.

The Porto Metropolitan Area and the case for effective decentralisation

The Porto Metropolitan Area may be one of the country’s most significant missed opportunities. It has universities, talent, businesses, innovation capacity and critical mass. Yet it remains constrained by limited financial autonomy, insufficient public investment and too few decision-making centres. There is little point in urging regions to generate wealth while denying them the tools required to do so.

For that reason, genuine decentralisation is needed-one that shifts more power to territories, strengthens decision-making centres beyond Lisbon and creates the conditions for skilled employment in every region.

European experience shows that territorial development depends on regions with clearly defined powers, financial autonomy and democratic accountability. This is not merely a political issue or a question of how the state is organised. It is a practical barrier to the personal and professional development of many young people, delaying-or making impossible-the start of a life project.

Addressing this problem requires everyone’s involvement. Above all, it requires political will to stop postponing the whole country.