How to Get EU Funding to Start a Farm in Portugal

Why Bother Funding Your Farm Yourself When Portugal Will Do It For You?

There is currently a significant amount of government money available in Portugal specifically for young people who want to start farming. We have had a few people come through our PDC courses over the years who either did not know about it, or thought the paperwork was too complicated to bother with. After seeing a recent article in the Portugal Resident outlining a €35 million support package being made available to 200 young farmers (under 41 years of age), it felt like a good moment to write about this properly and explain how it actually works.

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What the Scheme Actually Offers

Portugal’s young farmer support sits inside the European CAP (Common Agricultural Policy) framework and it is more generous than most people realise. The headline number is €55,000 given as a direct installation grant to a young farmer starting a new agricultural project. That money is yours to put into the business. Land, infrastructure, animals, equipment, whatever the project needs.

What most people miss is the matched funding element. Once you have approved your business plan, Portugal’s agricultural support system will match what you put in from your own side. If you have €55,000 of your own to invest on top of the grant, the total support you can access climbs to around €110,000. If you have more capital to commit, the match goes higher still. The numbers scale with your project and your resources.

If you are starting from scratch with nothing saved, you can still use the €55,000 grant itself as your matching contribution toward a co-funded project. The scheme is designed to not exclude people who are just getting started.

Portugal’s Minister of Agriculture confirmed in April 2026 that €351 million in total support is available for young farmers under this programme, with hundreds of applications already approved. aman-alliance

Who Qualifies

The scheme targets farmers under 40 (some routes under 35) who are setting up an agricultural holding for the first time. You do not have to be Portuguese, but you do need to be resident in Portugal and registering agricultural activity here. You need a business plan, which is where a lot of people get stuck, and evidence that your project is viable.

Access to land remains one of the main practical barriers for newcomers without family land behind them, but the scheme does not require you to own land outright. You can be leasing it. What matters is that you have a real project, a credible plan, and the basic documentation in order. agroberichtenbuitenland

Why Start with Your Own Money at All?

This is honestly the main thing I want people to take away from this post. A lot of people who come to our courses are sitting on savings, or planning to borrow money from family, or thinking about taking out a loan, to fund a land project in Portugal. In some cases they have not even heard that this scheme exists.

The point is not just that free money is good. It is that structuring a project correctly from the start, with a proper business plan written to match the funding criteria, gives you a much cleaner foundation for the whole thing. You are not just trying to survive the first two years on whatever you managed to save. You have a plan, a budget, and a real financial cushion behind you.

How the PDC Course Fits Into This

At Keela, we run Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) courses certified by the Permaculture Association. The design process at the core of a PDC is exactly the kind of structured thinking you need to put together a serious agricultural business plan. We work through site analysis, system design, yields, inputs, labour, and long-term land management across the two weeks.

For anyone who is planning to apply for young farmer funding, the PDC gives you a working draft of your project design as part of the course itself. We can also advise you directly on how to approach the funding application, what the programme looks for, and how to present your project in a way that is taken seriously.

We have helped 100s of people with their plans to start farms, homesteads and small gardens on our PDCs!