The archipelago

Madeira archipelago is located in the Atlantic Ocean, 500 km from Morocco coast  and 1000 km from the European continent, about 1h30 minutes by airplane from Lisbon, and it’s composed by the inhabited islands Madeira and Porto Santo and the uninhabited islands Desertas and Savages.

Madeira was discovered in 1419 by three Portuguese discoverers that named the island Madeira (“wood” in English) due to the abundance of this raw material. The island started to be colonized in 1425.
In 1976, Madeira became an Autonomous Region of Portugal, thus having the power to legislate.

The archipelago, included in the bio-geographic region of Macaronesia, retains a natural heritage of great scientific value, distinguished by UNESCO as World Natural Heritage.