In a year marked by the pandemic, the number of Portuguese municipalities that are distinguished as ‘Family Responsible’ by the Observatory for the Family Friendly Municipalities (OAFR) which this year celebrates its 13th edition, increased from 81 to 84.
In this edition, 132 portuguese municipalities filled the survey and 84 municipalities will receive the green flag of “Family Friendly Municipality”, a number that increased 3.7%, compared to the 81 entities last year. The municipalities awarded for the first time were: Alvaiázere (Leiria district); Arcos de Valdevez (Viana do Castelo district); Oleiros (Castelo Branco district) and Tavira (Faro district).
The districts with the highest number of distinguished municipalities were: Coimbra (11), Lisbon (10); Santarém (9); Aveiro and Braga (7 municipalities each). It should be noted that six municipalities have repeated the OAFR distinction for 13 years in a row now: Angra do Heroísmo, Cantanhede, Torres Novas, Torres Vedras, Vila de Rei and Vila Real.
Bragança, Évora and Portalegre districts continue not to have any awarded municipality, which data reports to the year 2020.
The head of the Observatory, Isabel Paula Santos, highlights that, in the pandemic context, “the portuguese municipalities had an extreme importance in providing extraordinary support to families and were at the forefront of outreach responses”.
In 2020 there was “an effective deepening of support to situations of risk, fragility and extreme need on the part of the local governments, that with their proximity responded to the weakening of families at all levels, in the global context that the COVID-19 pandemic reached in Portugal and in the world”, said the aforementioned.
The OAFR is a iniciative of the Portuguese Large Families Association and has Millennium bcp Foundation as Main Sponsor.
