We are advancing at an ever faster pace towards the transformation of the Portuguese people.

Last week, amid some important news and completely irrelevant topics that fill the national media agenda, census figures were released confirming the accelerated change of the Portuguese people.

This is a well-known and expected scenario. Warnings have been issued for over thirty years, and this topic has been discussed sporadically.

No government that has served in the three previous decades can claim ignorance of this issue.

Our people are aging, the proportion of older people is almost twice the proportion of young people, that is, we are rapidly approaching the ratio of 2 older people to 1 young person.

Serious about this indicator is the population’s inherent inability to naturally reverse this path from the aging of the intended parents, namely the declining number of women of childbearing age.

In addition, the aggravation of the decline in the production potential of the country’s population and the growth of tension are caused by the increasing drop in the costs of the non-production population for production.

The world population of Portugal has also declined by more than two hundred thousand inhabitants, in the last decade alone.

Personally, I am not so worried about the decrease in the number of Portuguese inhabitants in Portugal, as it would be quite possible to imagine a model of society that is economically and socially balanced, with much fewer people.

And given this scenario, what is the immediate reaction of many of our politicians and even experts in this field. Immigration, of course.

A country that has failed over the past thirty years to develop a strategy and policy that could successfully tackle the problem of generational change will no doubt try to hastily combine a set of measures that seek to rectify the situation. As a bad example, there is nothing better than the recent attempt to destroy the only organization with any ability to manage structured immigration processes.

Most of our governments, influenced by certain prejudices of some left-wing political forces, have always opposed the development of effective policies to promote childbirth, as if it meant attacking women’s rights or promoting a conservative view of society.

The economic model prevailing in Portugal does not help either. An economy with a weak business sector, in which companies in poor financial condition thrive, with a public sector such as the private sector that has experienced effective wage cuts, in which motherhood and fatherhood are viewed by many as a financial burden and inconvenience to operations, this is not creates a favorable environment for the necessary change in the situation.

The solution to the problem of immigration is now highlighted in an almost irresponsible way.

Some on the left, based on an assumed multiculturalism thesis that only masks the complexity of structured thinking about effective solutions, advocate a kind of liberalization of population flows as the simplest solution.

Coincidentally or not, the media presents us with news and programs that highlight successful examples of the integration of immigrants into our society.

I don’t understand how new this is.

Portugal and its people are historically practical proof of mixed marriages and intersecting cultures. As a people, we have many and varied ethnic and even religious backgrounds. While it is true that historically we have not always been tolerant of this diversity, the truth is that we have all come to this point together. Portuguese citizens of all stripes and shapes.

In recent years, for example, we have witnessed the success in sports that the combined impact of immigration, Portuguese diaspora and Portuguese-speaking backgrounds has allowed us to achieve.

It is important to repeat all this one more time so that once and for all the issue of the negative balance of generations can be discussed freely, without awkward kiosks of political correctness.

On the other hand, it is important to remember that for every successful immigration story, there are many more complex ones.

Obviously, there can be no single path solution to this equation.

It is important to develop strategies and policies once and for all on health, labor, social, financial and tax policies and policies to support childbearing, but it is also important to have an organized, fair and reasonable immigration policy.

Portugal must be able to maintain and even strengthen its “genetic code” as a hospitable and integrating country. This requires promoting a structured model for attracting immigrants, relying on careful selection based on the needs of our economy. Not so much from the point of view of the needs of the current economic model as from the point of view of how we want to see our future economic model.

The last thing I want as a citizen is for our current labor needs to continue and worsen the current economic model based on low skills, low wages and job insecurity. A situation that, unfortunately, given the numerous cases reported in agriculture, civil engineering and other sectors, seems to be emerging.

A country like ours, with the experience of our diaspora, cannot simply repeat with others what happened to our country.

It is important to be aware that current immigrants will in many cases become part of the Portuguese citizens of the future.