In a statement the association said that the legislation had been "buried for five years", and recalled that it had been in public consultation in 2015 and had never been approved "despite successive promises from various heads of the Environment Ministry".

Zero cites in particular former Secretary of State for the Environment Carlos Martins, who promised that the legislation would be published by June 2016, and later by the end of 2017, and the current incumbent, Inês Costa, who assured earlier this year that the process would be concluded by the end of the summer.

Zero points out that ProSolos would include an obligation to make the sale of land on which soil pollution risk activities have been installed conditional on the owner's submission of a report on the state of contamination.

The law also included the obligation to make the assessment of soil contamination by the owners of land where environmental risk activities have been carried out.