A study coordinated by former Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho, Socialist former MP Sérgio Sousa Pinto and the president of the Porto Commercial Association, Nuno Botelho, concluded that low productivity is the main obstacle to the growth of the Portuguese economy. The study, entitled "Blockages versus Reforms: a vision for Portugal," was unveiled by ACP-CCIP and aims to answer the central question of why Portugal has grown little, lost relative position in the European Union and continued without sustainably converging with more developed economies.
The study's main preliminary conclusion is that Portugal does not face just one isolated problem, but rather several blockages that reinforce each other and help explain a low-growth equilibrium. According to the association, even during periods of stronger recent growth, this resulted mainly from increased employment and not from significant productivity gains. Since 1999, the Portuguese economy has grown on average about 1.1% per year, one of the weakest performances in the European Union.
The study identifies blockages in areas such as human capital and management quality, investment and innovation, business scale, productive specialization, savings and financing, as well as in the functioning of the State and institutions. Among the specific factors mentioned are centralism, bureaucracy, taxation, sluggish justice system, housing difficulties and regulatory barriers, which constrain the mobility of resources, investment and growth capacity.
The study is developed in two stages: a first phase of diagnosing the main blockages and a second of identifying structural reforms. The public presentation is scheduled for the end of the year and the study will be delivered to the President of the Republic and the Government led by Luís Montenegro. The association also highlighted that it has been promoting a process of consulting specialists from different sectors of Portuguese society to enrich the diagnosis and prepare a final proposal useful for public debate.
