This week, the Municipality of Castro Marim begins work on expanding the Cheese Dairy at the Centro Multiusos do Azinhal, an intervention worth around 90,000.00 euros that focuses on the creation of an Experimental Nucleus, a pedagogical room attached to the existing structure. To implement this experimental unit, the useful area of the cheese factory will be increased by around 40m2.
Articulated with the values of the interior and the territory, this Experimental Nucleus will function as a “centre of living science”, reinforcing the work already done to value Algarve cheese and goat, a characteristic breed of the Algarve and with great expression in the territory of Castro Marim .
The Centro Multiusos do Azinhal has been the stage par excellence for initiatives and actions aimed at promoting goat and its derivatives, and it is also here that the “Terra de Maio” Fair is held, an event exclusively aimed at the promotion and increase of Goat de Algarve breed and the knowledge and flavors associated with it.
Raising Algarve cattle and goats is a business area for many families in the territory. It is also in the village of Azinhal that, since 1991, the Association of Breeders of the Algarve Breed – ANCCRAL operates, with the main objective of representing and defending its members in relation to the creation, preservation and improvement of the Algarve goats, contributing to the development of the activity and promotion of the breed and its products.
The work “Núcleo Experimental da Queijaria – Centro Multiusos do Azinhal” is an action of the candidacy “Heritages of Castro Marim: Valorization and Promotion of Local Producers and Endogenous Products”, supported by PO CRESC 2020, PADRE project, supported by Portugal and the European Union , 70% co-financed by the ERDF.