In recent weeks, Portugal and Spain have been affected by record droughts, "potentially the most serious" of the last twenty years, warns Ricardo Deus, director of the climate division at the Portuguese Institute of the sea and the atmosphere.
Dry and cracked lands, water reserves that are running out and lakes that are drying up… “I had never seen that”, confides for his part Carlos, his fishing rod in hand, glancing worried towards the Zêzere river.
The Portuguese, who has been fishing there for around thirty years, says he is very “concerned” by the flagrant drying up of the river whose sides are gradually being discovered.
“I only water once a week because the water sources have very little flow, laments Antonio Estevao, cheese maker and beekeeper.
Nothing grows and therefore the animals eat little.
Read alsoBrazil: a seaside town engulfed by rising waters
This early drought, exceptional in "its intensity, extent and duration", according to Ricardo Deus, is due to the lack of rain.
“In January, it only rained a quarter of what it should have rained at this time,” explains Ruben del Campo, spokesman for AEMET, the Spanish meteorological agency.
"If on these dates, when it should rain the most, it does not rain, not only the reserves do not recharge, but their capacity, their quantity of water continues to decrease and this can be worrying in the future. if the rains don't come because from May and June, entering summer, they never recharge,” he continues.
The depletion of water reserves, in addition to impacting the agricultural sector, also represents an additional danger for the Portuguese, strongly affected by the fires of 2017.