A resistência e recuperação económica das regiões portuguesas em períodos de crise

Abstract

In the last two decades, Portugal has experienced periods of economic recession that have put the country under social pressure. The concept of resilience is becoming increasingly present in national and international policy agendas and is reflected in the Recovery and Resilience Plans (RRP) of different European countries. The RRPs aim to support the recovery of European countries from the recent pandemic shock and prepare organizations for other possible shocks, linking the importance of increasing resilience to climate change with the need to support the digital transition. This research aims to analyze the resilience and recovery capacity of Portuguese sub-regions (NUT III), between 2000 and 2019. Firstly, a temporal analysis of the economic cycles of employment and GDP was carried out to identify the recessive and growth periods in Portugal. Then we calculated the resistance and recovery indexes, analyzed the results in the two periods and then compared both. After these procedures, the crisis with the most impact was analyzed, and the indices of resistance and recovery were engaged to a set of economic indicators. We conclude that the first crisis (2002) was not very expressive at the national level and had asymmetric impacts in a regional outlook. In contrast, the second crisis (2008) had strong repercussions at national level and in regional terms. We observe that Portuguese sub-regions have distinct resistance and recovery capacities, confirming the heterogeneity and territorial inequality. This heterogeneity is related to the sub-regional economic structure, where we identify homogeneous territorial profiles.