If we look to some data on what it concerns demographic, economic and tourism impacts, clearly we can see that the strategy is successful, and that there is a big difference on these more than 20 years that have gone since 1978.

Also important is that, not only there are new job opportunities, but Mértola was again placed back on the map, with a very positive image, as a project that can be trusted. This as proved also to have a positive influence:

- on other investments not specifically related with tourism (of which infrastructures is the most relevant);

- on the way local population look to its own town and territory, leaving behind the idea that this was dead, that here there was no chance for the future.

Perhaps it is important to review here that the project had three major steps:

- a first moment where scientific research was the major activity, an important step that gave team members a very deep knowledge of local resources – and not only on the cultural field. Also important because the quality of the results produced gave the team good name close to important national institutions and of the media, fact that was crucial for the second stage;

- the development of the different spaces that belong to the Town Museum. This stage is still not finished, but its major structures will open in a very short time. This particular area of work is the most relevant in tourism impacts. For this stage European funds were relevant. Also, and trying to keep a global approach both to the economic /social aspects as well as with the cultural, project development as lead to a big investment in vocational training, mostly of young people. From this source, we will probably find the staff required for new stages of the project, particularly in two fields: as technical aid in archaeological research, and as tourism activities staff, both in cultural and natural heritage fields.

- a third step, where urban rehabilitation of the historic area is being done – to give local heritage a global intervention, so that we do not have very nice museums in a badly conserved urban space; and along with the stimulation of the local economic tissue, so that it can be diversificated and strong enough to stand on its own, after Governmental and European funds disappear. This third stage includes a professional promotion strategy – carried out along with the Regional Tourism Board - and should, during the current year 2000, where all the new museums will start to work, implement all the necessary management and staff structure to be able to give a positive response to the visitors, giving them a response with the high degree of quality that the cultural tourism strategies demand.


As always, the biggest draw back that we had to face along all these years, were financement limitations to all the needs and proposals that have come about, also due to the fact that local investment capacity was, and is, very low.

It was then necessary to adopt a realistic strategy, that would allow the cross-channelling of those investments that were reached, with this obtaining the simultaneous progress of the following areas:

- scientific research (done with the help of the former National Scientific Research Bureau, now National Foundation for Science and Technology). In this particular field we should not forget the importance of international partnerships, once they have it possible the cultural & scientific exchanges, but also, they have enhanced the project’s prestige, factor that was most relevant in terms of its public image, both on a local and national levels;

- museology: done with the combination of Municipal budget, European funds and National tourism Office investments;

- vocational training (mostly of young people): in fields related with new needs in terms of local economic and cultural activities (mostly supported by the European Social Fund); first, in single actions, both promoted by the CAM and ADPM, and then, with the Bento de Jesus Caraça Vocational School, that opened, with the CAM, a local delegation. The work of this school, training students in Archaeology and Heritage activities, as proved to be of great importance;

- tourism promotion: using the existing channels that, at the beginning, in the Alentejo region were also very week structures. We have ground together and today the Regional Tourism Office (Planície Dourada) is one of our major supporters in promoting Mértola Vila Museu’s project;

It is difficult, actually, to define which of these fields were more or less relevant. In fact, they were and are all fundamental, once the meal would not taste the same if one of the ingredients would be missing. However, in CAM’s perspective, we could say that the foundations off all, in a sense of a quality that makes this project at least different from a mere economic development strategy, is scientific research; in other words, the fact that the elements that are the prime source of a culturally based tourism promotion are carefully and consistently studied, researched, related with its historical origins and evolution, consciously placed in the centre of attentions, once these are in fact the reason for it all. Without them, and without a rigorous work in this field, the project would soon become “just another marketing strategy”, and, once its novelty factor close to external audiences would disappear, it would tend to gradually have shorter and shorter impacts on local development.


The first small achievements of our scientific and heritage safeguard work, if they – only by themselves – were not able to obtain bigger resources, they have contributed to a good and solid image – close to the public and of the financial supporters of our local institutions. Mértola, due to this, moved from a back seat – in terms of is visibility - to the first row, and more prepared for the next stage to come.

We can describe as the turning point of our project the stage when, instead of having to search for all funding for the project development, external sponsors started to come to us with proposals.

Of those, the most important was the one made by managers and politicians of the Portuguese Tourism Governmental Structures. It is a known trend, that cultural tourism is a spreading market all over the world and in the newly proposed thematic cultural roads, Mértola is an important element in three of them:

- the Islamic Heritage (and Mértola, in portuguese terms, is very important in this particular field);
- the Roman Heritage – less important than the previous, but, due to the river, surely one of the main Southern Portugal towns in the Republican and Imperial periods in Iberia;
- traditions of the rural world - once Mértola become under heritage safeguard strategies in time to salvage from disappearance some traditional activities and objects related with other periods of its historical evolution.

The relevant group of cultural resources lead Government Authorities to decide to invest, finally, a considerable amount of funds, in order to allow the team to finish the town museums, so these could have the role of locomotive, in what it concerns local development.

Fortunately (once I think they have the most positive influence) there were conditions to this financement, the major of those related with the Tourism Services to be made available for the visiting audiences. At the time, in fact, the support structure, in terms of the tourism service that was associated to the museums, was, in spite of an honest effort, quite week and very unprofessional – in spite the fact that already two people worked full time in this, but clearly it was not enough, nor consistent all along the year. So, the commitment now requires (and it will start to be so during this year of conclusion of all the new spaces) the nucleous to be open on a regular schedule, suitable for visitors, and with the possibility of also finding guided visits for special audiences (like schools); their second demand was that visitors could access their National Tourism Database System on a 24 hours basis – service made available in our new Multimedia Heritage Centre, also to be opened quite soon.

Undoubtedly, Mértola is a clear case where domino effect impacts can be seen. A place where, simultaneously, the museums are being done, scientific research follows on, tourists come along, jobs and vocational training are being generated, a mingle of impacts and influences that we now can not see isolated. From the first small steps to today, there is a chain of exchanges and influences among its internal factors, that nothing, but a global overview, can efficiently display the image of the project.


Rui Mateus
Researcher, Campo Arqueológico de Mértola (CAM)
email: epbjc.mt@mail.telepac.pt