The international tender for setting up broadband networks in the so-called "blank areas" (territories where there is no network coverage, or it is not of suitable quality) was launched on Tuesday 12 December. This project will cover more than 400 thousand homes in various areas inland, leading to the entire mainland territory being covered by 2026/2027. 

The overall investment amounts to 425 million euros, around 150 million euros from the Portugal 2030 Regional Programme and the remainder from national funds. 

At the ceremony launching this international tender (which has been given a green light by the European Commission), held this afternoon in Belmonte, Castelo Branco district, the Prime Minister noted internal cohesion as one of the main pillars of the Government’s strategy for developing the territory, along with foreign competitiveness, stressing the importance of providing to the entire territory the essential infrastructure for the future, such as broadband connections. 

António Costa underlined the difficulty of the requirements imposed by the European commission, namely the need for referencing the fibreoptics network dwelling by dwelling, before noting that Portugal was the first EU country to "be able to carry this out", guided by the sector regulator ANACOM. 

"We are at the forefront, that is a huge competitive edge", the Prime Minister stated, adding that this project "is not just for attracting high tech firms", it is also "essential to properly serve the firms we already have" inland. And to create jobs, as the population will only settle "where there is employment". 

This project is in line with the same purpose as other programmes and investments such as new cross-border connections to create "greater density between the Portuguese and Spanish borders", investing in and enhancing higher education institutions in these regions, setting the conditions to reduce red tape cots, positive discrimination tax-wise, namely corporate income tax, as well as the decentralisation process. "We followed a coherent and integrated strategy to develop the inland areas. Does it yield results in two years? No, it does not yield results in two years. Yet it creates the conditions for the next few decades to invert the previous six decades, from the 1960s to today. That is the work we have ahead of us. And the investment now made, to provide these regions with broadband connections with the same quality as the coastal areas, won’t solve the problem, but it preps the soil for sowing", claimed the Prime Minister. 

Prior to this, the Minister of Territorial Cohesion Ana Abrunhosa had stressed the central nature of the inland territories: "Our inland territories have a future. We are not the end of the country; we are the heart of the Iberian Peninsula". 

João Cadete de Matos, chair of ANACOM, noted that with this project "the regional asymmetries will be significantly corrected": "We will become a country on the same track, a fairer country".