When you live in a place like the Moinhos do Dão, where the river and woods are your daily world, you cannot just stand and watch idly by when you see the damage caused by pollution in the river, ‘eucalyptification’ of the landscape for short term economic gain and fires every year due to poor land management. Environmental protection has become an undeniable necessity for us not just because of where we live, but also because we think the natural world at large needs protection. We wanted to ‘do something’ so we started a group, using the Projecto Rios method, that monitors the Dão river and its banks and aims to raise awareness about the importance of healthy ecosystems and clean rivers.
The local response has been very positive and we have a growing group of members from many different backgrounds and ages. All members live near or on the Dão river, all have their own story about their personal connection to the river and all want to be active in protecting and retrieving the natural beauty and biodiversity of the Dão river and valley. We feel lucky to find such a willing response in our local community and hope we can really make a difference together.
Each year CuidaDão will do two ‘saidas-do-campo’ (river monitoring sessions) and organize one public activity for which we invite school groups and locals to clean up the riverbanks together. We will keep you posted on this website.
