Eurico Brilhante Dias, who was speaking at a conference in Lisbon on economic relations with Mozambique, stressed that the country will also need to be able to be able to pay for the level of imports necessary to attract investment.

"The development, growth and internationalisation of Portuguese companies is … very important for the Portuguese economy,” he told his audience. “If Portugal does not, in the medium term, achieve exports of 50% of GDP, it will have big, big difficulties in competing, so as to sustain growth and the level of imports necessary for investment.

“And for us, that is a central element," he added.

In his speech, Brilhante Dias highlighted what he said were the current good conditions for Portuguese companies to do business in Mozambique in the form of partnerships with local firms, although he said more work is needed to provide information and finance.

On Tuesday a report from Portugal’s National Statistics Institute showed that the country’s exports were in august up 14.3% on the same month of last year, while imports were up 12.8%. As a result, the deficit for the month widened €105 million on a year earlier, to €1.316 billion.